An alternative access method for the same information available from the CNI-ANNOUNCE listserv.
National Monument Landscape Audit Report
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has been funding a major initiative to examine and transform monuments and memorials (see https://mellon.org/initiatives/monuments/ )
On September 29, 2021 they hosted a fascinating webinar (see https://monumentalconversations.splashthat.com/MellonEventsPage ) to mark the release of one important component of this initiative, the Monument Landscape Audit, which was conducted in partnership with an organization called Monument Lab (a very interesting organization in its own right, see the website at monumentlab.com). My understanding is that a video recording of the webinar will be available shortly, and it’s well worth watching.
The Mellon announcement on the report can be found at https://mellon.org/news-blog/articles/national-monument-audit/ and the Monument Lab announcement is at
Note that in the coming week or so there are several additional online events to provide more detail on this work and how it may be used. Registration information is available on the page at Monument Lab.
This work frames an enormous number of important and fascinating questions about the nature and purpose of monuments and memorials and the roles of memory and stewardship organizations with regard to these artifacts, particularly when their political and social roles change over time. I am hoping that we can explore some of these questions in upcoming CNI events.
Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI
Reminder: Call for Proposals, CNI Fall ’21
As a reminder, we are now accepting proposals for project briefings to be presented during CNI’s Fall 2021 Membership Meeting. The virtual event will take place online Dec. 6-9; the in-person event will take place Dec. 13-14 in Washington, DC, at the JW Marriott Hotel.
Anyone may propose a project briefing, including groups/individuals from non-member institutions and organizations.
Live (synchronous) time slots will be reserved for topics that would particularly benefit from interactive discussion. Speakers may request to present a live (synchronous) project briefing (either virtually Dec. 6-9 or in-person Dec. 13-14), though a very small number of proposals will be selected for synchronous or in-person presentation; the great majority of project briefings will be pre-recorded. If the in-person event shifts to virtual due to public health considerations, in-person project briefings scheduled for Dec. 13-14 will move to virtual synchronous sessions on Dec. 13-15. Once accepted, speakers who are selected for live sessions will be contacted regarding the schedule.
We strongly urge all those presenting synchronous project briefings (virtual or in person) to grant CNI permission to record and make their session subsequently available.
Project briefings focus on a timely topic or on a specific institutional/organizational project related to digital information; they can also explore parallel developments across institutions. Briefings address state-of-the-art developments and issues of interest to the membership, as have been outlined in CNI’s Program Plan (https://www.cni.org/program) and recent Executive Roundtable reports (https://www.cni.org/tag/executive-roundtable-report). Management of data, digital content, and institutional information resources; digital preservation; innovations in teaching and learning; and infrastructure to support research are topics that consistently engage CNI members’ interests.
A limited number of project briefings will be accepted.
Proposals may be submitted via online form:
https://www.cni.org/mm/fall-2021/project-briefing-proposals-f21
Deadline for submissions is October 11, 2021
More information, including a preliminary schedule-at-a-glance, is at https://www.cni.org/mm/fall-2021.
Follow the meeting: #cni21f
-Paige Pope, CNI
US Copyright Office Session on Machine Learning and Copyright, October 26, 2021
The US Copyright Office, in partnership with the Patent and Trademark Office, is convening (apparently both via Zoom and in person), a session on the interactions between copyright law and machine learning/artificial Intelligence. This is an interesting and very poorly understood or explored area, and the discussions should be very timely. I don’t know if these are going to be recorded for subsequent viewing. Information on the session, which is free but requires advanced registration, can be found at
https://copyright.gov/events/machine-learning/
Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI
National Security Agency on Quantum Resistant Cryptography
The US National Security Agency (NSA) has produced a rather interesting PDF FAQ on post-quantum cryptography, which can be found at
https://media.defense.gov/2021/Aug/04/2002821837/-1/-1/1/Quantum_FAQs_20210804.PDF
I’m sorry for not catching this and sharing it more promptly. There is also some press coverage here:
https://www.theregister.com/2021/09/01/nsa_quantum_computing_faq/
Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI
Study of COVID-19 impact on academic publishing patterns
Here’s an interesting preprint (I am somewhat unclear where it stands in the publication process and if it’s been through peer review, though it appears like it may come out in a UK Royal Society venue) which looks at publication patterns by discipline during the pandemic. There’s been a lot of anecdote about what’s happening here, but this is one of the few data-based presentations I’ve seen. My thanks to the amazing Gary Price for bring this to my attention. See
https://arxiv.org/abs/2109.06591
Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI
National Academies Toolkit for Fostering Open Science Practices Event, Sept 30, 2021
Some of you may have attended a virtual workshop hosted by the US National Academies in November 2020 which introduced a draft toolkit for fostering open science practices. This September, the Academies are holding a launch event for the report of that workshop, which will also include case studies following on from the workshop exploring ways in which the toolkit can be used.
Information on the event and the background work can be found here:
There’s no charge, but you do need to register in advance for the event.
Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI
Call for Proposals, CNI Fall ’21
Proposals are now being accepted for project briefings to be presented during CNI’s Fall 2021 Membership Meeting. At this time, we expect to hold BOTH a virtual event and an in-person event, each independently of one another, and designed to complement each other. The virtual event will take place online Dec. 6-9; the in-person event will take place Dec. 13-14 in Washington, DC, at the JW Marriott Hotel.
Anyone may propose a project briefing, including groups/individuals from non-member institutions and organizations.
Live (synchronous) time slots will be reserved for topics that would particularly benefit from interactive discussion. Speakers may request to present a live (synchronous) project briefing (either virtually Dec. 6-9 or in-person Dec. 13-14), though a very small number of proposals will be selected for synchronous or in-person presentation; the great majority of project briefings will be pre-recorded. If the in-person event shifts to virtual due to public health considerations, in-person project briefings scheduled for Dec. 13-14 will move to virtual synchronous sessions on Dec. 13-15. Once accepted, speakers who are selected for live sessions will be contacted regarding the schedule.
We strongly urge all those presenting synchronous project briefings (virtual or in person) grant CNI permission to record and make their session subsequently available.
Project briefings focus on a timely topic or on a specific institutional/organizational project related to digital information; they can also explore parallel developments across institutions. Briefings address state-of-the-art developments and issues of interest to the membership, as have been outlined in CNI’s Program Plan (https://www.cni.org/program) and recent Executive Roundtable reports: (https://www.cni.org/tag/executive-roundtable-report). Management of data, digital content, and institutional information resources; digital preservation; innovations in teaching and learning; and infrastructure to support research are topics that consistently engage CNI members’ interests.
A limited number of project briefings will be accepted.
Proposals may be submitted via online form:
https://www.cni.org/mm/fall-2021/project-briefing-proposals-f21
Deadline for submissions is October 11, 2021
More information, including a preliminary schedule-at-a-glance, is at https://www.cni.org/mm/fall-2021.
Follow the meeting: #cni21f
-Diane Goldenberg-Hart, CNI
WSJ Article on Carnegie Mellon Cloudlab Initiative
The August 31, 2021 Wall Street Journal carried an article on the strategic Cloudlab initiative at Carnegie Mellon University. See
This is an important development that we highlighted in our most recent Executive Roundtable on Research Continuity, see
https://www.cni.org/go/future-research-enterprise-june-2021
CNI will continue to track developments in this area, and I continue to welcome updates from other institutions doing related work.
Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI
JCDL 2021 (virtual) Registration
CNI is pleased to be a cooperating organization for the Joint Conference on Digital Libraries (JCDL) again this year.
JCDL 2021 will be online, Sept. 27-30, 2021.
Registration is open: https://2021.jcdl.org/registration/
Advanced registration ends Sept. 20
-Diane Goldenberg-Hart, CNI
Workshop on Analyzing Internet Engineering Task Force Data
The Internet Activities Board and the Internet Engineering Task Force are convening a very interesting and unusual workshop (invitation copied below) exploring what might be done analyzing the extraordinarily well documented and open record of standards-making and related developments for the internet over the past decades. I thought that this invitation might be of interest to some CNI-announce readers who perhaps might not have seen it.
Clifford Lynch
Director, CNI
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Show me the numbers: Workshop on Analyzing IETF Data (AID), 2021
Web Page: https://www.iab.org/activities/workshops/aid/
The IETF as an international Standards Developing Organization hosts
diverse data on the history, development, and current activities in the
development and standardization of Internet protocols and its
institutions. A large portion of this data is publicly available, yet
this data is arguably underutilized as a tool to inform the work in the
IETF and research on topics like Internet governance and trends in ICT
standard-setting.