Speakers
Keynotes
(they/them)
Arizona State University
Speaker Bio for Nikko Stevens
Dr. Nikko Stevens is a critical technology researcher, software engineer, and community organizer. As an academic, Stevens studies the ways that data infrastructures--data models, databases, data structures--can reinforce existing social inequality, and, crucially, how we can use data infrastructures to guide us towards the worlds we wish to build. As a software engineer, led the architecture of web properties for billion-dollar corporations like Coca-Cola, Sony, and Instagram, and their work won numerous awards, including at SXSW. As a community organizer, Stevens's work in the Drupal community earned them the Aaron Winborn Award and recognitions by Red Hat and The Linux Foundation. They are currently a postdoctoral researcher at MIT where they are writing *Abolitionist Engineering,* a book about data infrastructure, software engineering, and the contemporary prison abolition movement.
(she/her)
Penn State University Libraries
Speaker Bio for Ruth Kitchin Tillman
Ruth Kitchin Tillman is the Cataloging Systems and Linked Data Strategist at Penn State University Libraries. Her current research focuses on library systems and the people who use and maintain them. She has also written and presented on metadata encoding standards, library discovery, linked data, institutional repositories, and labor issues in libraries. She previously worked with institutional repositories as the Digital Collections Librarian at the University of Notre Dame and as the Metadata Librarian in the library at NASA Goddard. Ruth holds an MLS from the University of Maryland. She maintains the EADiva resource which documents EAD2002 and EAD3 for a non-technical audience. She is a former editor of the Code4Lib Journal and maintained the journal's website from 2015-2021.
Talks and Workshops
(They/He)
Emory University
Speaker Bio for Andrew Battelini
Talk: An Introduction to Transkribus: An AI tool for digital interpretation of historical documents
(He/Him)
California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt
Speaker Bio for AJ Bealum
Talk: The 3D Herbarium and 3DExhibits4Learning: A New Student Powered Learning Platform
Senior Software Engineer
MIT Libraries
Profile Image Description
Matt is a balding middle-aged white male, with wire rim glasses, wearing a collared button down shirt. He has a laptop bag over his shoulder, and he is squinting slightly into bright daylight.
Speaker Bio for Matt Bernhardt
Matt (he /him) is a senior software engineer at the MIT Libraries on discovery and CMS projects. He has previously worked as an educational technology professional across a variety of contexts: web development and design, digital fabrication, data visualization and modeling, and technology support. He holds an architecture degree from Ohio State University. Outside of work, he pays too much attention to space, soccer, and F1.
(she/her/hers)
Digital Preservation Coordinator
University of Texas Libraries
Profile Image Description
A young white latina woman with dark curly hair wearing dark-framed glasses is smiling at the camera. A library help desk is behind her.
Speaker Bio for Karla Roig Blay
Karla Roig Blay (she/her) is an early-career digital preservationist. In her current position as the Digital Preservation Coordinator, she manages the University of Texas Libraries’ digital archive for long-term digital preservation. Her professional interests are focused on digital stewardship of cultural heritage materials, digital humanities, latin american collections, and museum studies.
Talk: From Meme to Machine - How Our Gen Z Digital Preservation System has Come of Age
(she/her/hers)
(he/him/his)
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Speaker Bio for Brian Cain
Talk: Replacing Digital Repository Infrastructure at Los Alamos National Laboratory
(she/her/hers)
Software Engineer
Harvard University - Library Technology Services
Profile Image Description
An Asian woman with long black hair and circular, metal-framed glasses.
Speaker Bio for JJ Chen
Hello World! I'm JJ (Jiajie) Chen, a software and data engineer with an interest in AI/ML, distributed system architecture, and scientific computing.
Talk: Reimagining Harvard Collections: AI-enhanced Discovery
(he/him)
Asst. Director, Library Software Engineering
Princeton University Library
Profile Image Description
A bald, middle-aged white man with a close-trimmed red beard which is graying at the chin, wearing tortoiseshell glasses and a dark blue hoodie.
Speaker Bio for Esmé Cowles
I am a technologist with more than twenty years of experience building open software and standards.
Workshop: How To Host Code4Lib
(They/Them)
Early Career Fellow
Princeton University Library
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A light-complexion masculine-presenting individual with a short, curly haircut wearing round glasses and blue-green floral print buttoned down shirt.
Speaker Bio for Beck Davis
Beck is an Early Career Fellow on the Princeton University Library IT Operations team. They gained experience in cataloging and metadata transformation before diving headfirst into DevOps Engineering and Systems Administration. They hold a MLS from North Carolina Central University and occasionally hold a very large cat or very small dog on zoom calls.
Talk: We Fixed Monitoring, and So Can You! (Movie Narrator’s Voice: “No, they did not.”)
Talk: Enhancing MARC Language Metadata with Ruby and Indigenous Tenacity
(she/her)
Systems Librarian
Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine
Profile Image Description
Cartoon avatar of a quite pale white bespectacled brunette geek girl whose open downturned mouth is adamantly advocating an important point or three. A bookcase is behind her.
Speaker Bio for Katherine "Kate" Deibel
Dr. Kate Deibel is a longstanding advocate for accessibility and usability in library technologies. She has a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Washington but would much rather talk about web comics, chili peppers, her cat, technology adoption, and changing the world. She briefly left libraries for industry but is happily back working as PCOM Library's systems librarian.
Talk: Making the Development Process Inclusive of Disabilities
(he/him/his)
University of Rochester
Speaker Bio for John Dewees
Talk: Getting Everyone on the Same Page: Building a Shared Governance Structure for Digital Projects
(she/her/hers)
Software Developer
UCLA
Profile Image Description
Profile image for Jen Diamond. She has auburn hair, short bangs, green eyes and is smiling with her mouth closed.
Speaker Bio for Jen Diamond
Jen Diamond is a Software Developer at UCLA and a passionate advocate for community-driven learning. A self-taught programmer, she led RailsGirls & RailsBridge Los Angeles for seven years, helping to make the tech industry more diverse and accessible. When she’s not coding, she enjoys lunchtime walks with her kitten, Powell, in Elysian Park, as well as playing guitar, sewing, painting, biking, yoga, and exploring the airwaves as a licensed ham radio operator (KO6FCG).
Talk: The Dev & Designer Power Duo -- Secrets to Seamless Collaboration
University of Utah
Speaker Bio for Matthew Elliott
Talk: Preserving History Through Advanced 3D Scanning: A Case Study on Gaussian Splat Photogrammetry
Workshop: Photogrammetry with RealityCapture: A Practical Introduction
(she/her)
Curator of Numismatics
University of Calgary
Speaker Bio for Marina Fischer
Marina Fischer is a Curator of Numismatics at Nickle Galleries, Libraries and Cultural Resources at the University of Calgary. She holds an M.A. in Ancient History with specialization in Art History from the University of Calgary. She oversees the university’s vast money collection of 23,000 objects spanning from the beginning of coinage in the 7th century BCE to the modern period. She is a recipient of a University of Calgary Teaching Award, and lectures frequently in various departments across campus.
Talk: Transforming Museums: Harnessing the Power of Digital Technologies
(she/her/hers)
University of Rochester
Speaker Bio for Lauren Gallina
Talk: Getting Everyone on the Same Page: Building a Shared Governance Structure for Digital Projects
(he/him/his)
Head of Preservation & Digital Stewardship
University of Texas Libraries (University of Texas at Austin)
Profile Image Description
Portrait photograph of a middle-aged white man with balding grey hair and a thick-rimmed glasses. He is wearing a checkered shirt and smiles uncomfortably into the camera.
Speaker Bio for Mirko Hanke
I oversee the preservation program for the University of Texas Libraries, which includes digital preservation, digitization, digital asset management, digital archives support, and traditional preservation. My team members and I collaborate with content curators and other relevant stakeholders in the organization to address preservation needs across the Libraries' collections. When I am not at work I enjoy running and knitting, though rarely at the same time.
Talk: From Meme to Machine - How Our Gen Z Digital Preservation System has Come of Age
(he/him/his)
GBH Media Library & Archives
(他)
Free Ebook Foundation
Profile Image Description
Face of a hooded old guy with a steampunk monocle referencing Mad-eye Moody.
Speaker Bio for Eric Hellman
Eric Hellman is an electrical engineer identifying as a physicist with librarian tendencies. Ask him about the double-relative-redirect megabug.
Graduate Student
Indiana University
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Speaker Bio for Sarah Hensler
Sarah Hensler is in her final semester of her MLS program at Indiana University, where she does a little bit of everything- manuscript processing at the Lilly Library, digital humanities at the Global and International School, and even some religious archiving. She works predominantly in archival outreach to K-12 educators. When she's not in class or on the clock, Sarah is probably making ugly graphic design, doing history research, or having yet another cup of coffee.
Talk: If You Give a Girl a Website (She'll ask for metadata searching)
(she/her/hers)
Digital Content Metadata Specialist
Johns Hopkins Sherdian Libraries
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A white woman in her thirties with blond pink hair and glasses is smiling at the camera. A dark green wall with photos and a lamp is behind her.
Speaker Bio for Michelle Janowiecki
Michelle Janowiecki is a metadata librarian whose work focuses on digital collections, metadata remediation, and anything bulk editing. She's passionate about Python, the power of APIs, and critical cataloging practices.
Talk: Building my own tools: Creating reusable Python scripts for my most common spreadsheet tasks
(she/her/hers)
Library IT Operations Engineer
Princeton University
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Speaker Bio for Vickie Karasic
Vickie joined Princeton University Library in June 2022; she provides support and instruction around several library-wide applications and assists with network infrastructure, security, monitoring, and maintenance. Previously, her work focused on teaching, research, and learning within educational technology, library spaces, and subject collections. Vickie holds an MLIS from Drexel University, MA in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University, and BA in Comparative Literature and French from Cornell University.
Talk: We Fixed Monitoring, and So Can You! (Movie Narrator’s Voice: “No, they did not.”)
Associate Head of IT
North Carolina State University Libraries
Profile Image Description
A middle-aged white man with short brown hair and a goatee with beard, both of which are sparkled with white, wearing a dark gray sport coat and light gray sweater vest over a light blue dress shirt, smiling at a bad joke he just made.
Speaker Bio for Mike Kastellec
I lead the core infrastructure and developer support team at the NC State Libraries. Before that, I was a Libraries Fellow. Before that, I supported technology in public libraries. I am not a coder, but I could play one on TV.
Talk: Bots Behaving Badly: How We Learned to Tolerate Crawlers Without Losing Our Minds
Talk: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck About Getting Things Done
(he/him)
Metadata Operations Specialist
GBH Archives
Profile Image Description
Selfie photograph of a middle-aged white man with graying hair, wearing a casual, striped shirt and a light nylon windbreaker. He is standing outside, in a field, with red brick university buildings behind him.
Speaker Bio for Owen C. King
Owen C. King is Metadata Operations Specialist at GBH Archives, working on the American Archive of Public Broadcasting. He coordinates work on automated processing and metadata workflows for archival television and radio programming. He has a background in philosophy, with research and teaching in well-being and information ethics.
(she/her/hers)
New York Public Library/Brooklyn Public Library
(he/him/his)
(she/her/hers)
UCLA
University of Texas at San Antonio
Speaker Bio for Diane Lopez
Talk: UTSA Libraries presents the Sounds of San Anto: exploring how digital tools can enhance storytelling
(she/her/hers)
Pennsylvania State University
Speaker Bio for Binky Lush
(she/her/hers)
Head, Digital Media Software Development
Indiana University
Profile Image Description
Casual selfie of a white woman with long brunette hair and brown eyes taken in the middle of a run on a pier with Lake Michigan in the background
Speaker Bio for Emily Lynema
Emily is the head of Digital Media Software Development at the Indiana University Library (Bloomington). She leads a team of developers (and a PO!) that support the Avalon Media System, an open source platform in the Samvera community for managing and accessing digital audiovisual materials. The group is also building the Audiovisual Metadata Platform, which attempts to leverage machine learning/AI tools to generate metadata for AV media.
Talk: Whisper speech-to-text for digitized historical audiovisual materials
(he/him/his)
VectorLink
Speaker Bio for Gavin Mendel-Gleason
Talk: Text Embeddings for Entity Resolution and Name Disambiguation in the Library Catalog
Librarian
University of Notre Dame
Profile Image Description
Eric is a librarian who works at the University of Notre Dame.
Speaker Bio for Eric Lease Morgan
Eric Lease Morgan is a librarian working in the Navari Family Center for Digital Scholarship, Hesburgh Libraries, University of Notre Dame where he provides text mining and natural language processing services to the University community. He does data science with words.
(they/them)
Metadata Analyst
University of Texas at Austin
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A color photograph of a non-binary individual from the waist up. The person is wearing a thick sweater, two necklaces made of dentalium shell, gold metal, and beads, and has their long hair down. The figure is looking off to the right side, smiling mildly. It is equal measures polite interest and disintrest.
Speaker Bio for Devon Murphy
Devon Murphy (they/them) currently works as the Metadata Analyst at the University of Texas at Austin. In this role, Murphy oversees standards, policies, and data models for the Libraries' holdings. They received dual masters degrees in Art History and Information Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2019), examining cataloging of Cherokee baskets by Native and non-Native institutions. Some of their previous work includes the Best Practices for Queer Metadata (2024) and the Metadata Best Practices for Trans and Gender Diverse Resources (2022). Murphy also serves as a member of the Visual Resources Association’s (VRA) Equitable Action Committee.
Talk: “Wait, why are we doing this again?” Cultural humility approaches to metadata remediation
Lead Librarian for UX Strategy
NC State University Libraries
Profile Image Description
Torso shot of a curly-haired, male-presenting person, in profile, wearing a red jacket, thick gloves, glasses, and black facemask, and wielding a longsword in a high guard. In the background is a statue of a bull and, further back, skyscrapers.
Speaker Bio for Andreas Orphanides
Andreas Orphanides is the Lead Librarian for UX Strategy at the NC State University Libraries. His work focuses on developing high-quality, thoughtfully designed technology solutions to support teaching, learning, and information discovery. His professional interests include systems analysis, human factors, and information design. Outside of work, he has too many cats.
Workshop: Fail4Lib 2025
(he/him/his)
NC State University Libraries
Speaker Bio for Jon Page
Talk: Bots Behaving Badly: How We Learned to Tolerate Crawlers Without Losing Our Minds
(she/her)
Web Designer/Front-end Developer
University Libraries (University at Albany)
Profile Image Description
Woman with gold-rimmed glasses and short, salt-and-pepper hair gives a friendly smile while standing in front of a blue wood-block-printed wallpaper.
Speaker Bio for Alyssa Panetta
Alyssa has been designing and developing websites by hand since Y2K and is currently Web Designer/Developer for the University Libraries, University at Albany. After a diagnosis of brain cancer in 2020 and subsequent treatment, she became keenly aware of the issues faced by users with cognitive disabilities on the complex websites she maintains. Since then, she advocates for and teaches techniques for lowering the cognitive load of such websites and writes letters to her removed tumor that is preserved in a tumor research bank on her website deartalula.com.
Talk: The Best (and Worst) Widgets, AI Tools and Browser Extensions for ADA Compliance
(He/Him)
Technology Engagement Librarian
University of Utah
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Brandon is smiling and appears to be in a professional setting, wearing a button-up shirt and jacket.
Speaker Bio for Brandon Patterson
Brandon Patterson is the Technology Engagement Librarian at the Spencer S. Eccles Health Sciences Library at the University of Utah. He connects students, staff, and faculty to digital tools and emerging technologies. He is a health sciences education liaison and coordinates with faculty to incorporate information literacy instruction and educational technology into their classrooms.
Talk: Preserving History Through Advanced 3D Scanning: A Case Study on Gaussian Splat Photogrammetry
Workshop: Photogrammetry with RealityCapture: A Practical Introduction
(He/Him)
Library IT Operations Fellow
Princeton University
Profile Image Description
A bald headed black male with thinly trimmed mustache with hints of black and grey hair. Wearing a blue suit, white shirt and a light blue tie looking dapper yet professional with the car park in the background
Speaker Bio for Denzil Phillips
Denzil Phillips is an Early-Career Fellow with the Library IT Operations Team at Princeton University, where he supports library applications, automates and manages virtual infrastructure monitoring, and enhances digital repositories. His work focuses on servers, storage, security, and virtualization to ensure smooth tech operations. Denzil holds a Master’s in Management and Leadership (Western Governors University, 2021), a graduate certificate in Business Analytics (East Carolina University, 2023), and a Master’s in Information Science (North Carolina Central University, 2023). Prior to Princeton, he worked in public libraries and interned at RTI International, curating and updating metadata for research outputs and publications. Originally from Cape Town, South Africa, Denzil is passionate about using technology to improve library services and stay ahead of IT trends.
Talk: We Fixed Monitoring, and So Can You! (Movie Narrator’s Voice: “No, they did not.”)
(he/him)
Lead Engineer
MIT Libraries
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Jeremy, a middle aged white man with short hair, black glasses, and a grey and brown beard is wearing a tan sweater. In the background are two blurred computer screens with text that is very likely code.
Speaker Bio for Jeremy Prevost
When not working on some of the coolest acronymed library discovery products ('TIMDEX Is Making Discovery EXcellent' and 'TACOS: Totally Awesome Categorization Of Searchterms'), Jeremy can often be found decorating frisbees in his basement and then throwing them at trees with family and friends.
(He/His)
Northwestern University Libraries
Speaker Bio for Brendan Quinn
Talk: Continuing the Conversation: Building Open-Source Semantic Discovery Tools
(she/her/hers)
Brandeis University
(she/they)
University of Michigan
Information Specialist, Digital Projects
University of Texas at San Antonio
Profile Image Description
A person wearing glasses with no rims gazes awkwardly into the camera, attempting a friendly smile. He has gray-streaked hair in a ponytail and wears a blue guayabera.
Speaker Bio for Javier Ruedas
Javier Ruedas is an Information Specialist working on digital projects for UTSA Libraries. He has a background in web programming and tech education. He spent several years working for tech boot camps before coming to UTSA. He has worked with multiple full-stack web development frameworks, from early days with PHP and MySQL, to Ruby on Rails, Spring Boot, and JavaScript stacks with NoSQL. Javier's formal education is in anthropology and information studies, and he has carried out fieldwork in the Javari River Basin, Brazil.
Talk: UTSA Libraries presents the Sounds of San Anto: exploring how digital tools can enhance storytelling
(they/them)
Senior Library Software Engineer
Princeton University Library
Speaker Bio for Bess Sadler
Bess has been building free and open source software for almost thirty years and believes in the liberation potential of open culture, open science, and open technology. Currently, they work building infrastructure to enable reproducible open science.
Talk: Infosec for a world at war
Workshop: Agile4Lib
(He/Him)
Lead Products Manager
Northwestern University Libraries
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Speaker Bio for David Schober
David Schober is an experienced product and technical manager with over 20 years in digital solutions and open-source projects. As Lead Product Manager at Northwestern University Libraries, he has directed initiatives such as the creation of the Digital Collections platform, the shift to generative AI, and the transition to AWS solutions. His previous roles include managing digital strategy for scientific journals at the American Academy of Pediatrics and overseeing large-scale digital properties at the Poetry Foundation and Rotary International. Active in the open-source community, he has served as the chair of the Samvera Board and serves on the IIIF Executive Committee.
Talk: Continuing the Conversation: Building Open-Source Semantic Discovery Tools
(she/her/hers)
Pennsylvania State University
Speaker Bio for Sarah Smulligan
(he/him)
Digital Processing Archivist
University of Texas Libraries
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Jeremy, an African American male, is smiling as pictured from the chest up. He is wearing a navy blue shirt with light blue diamonds and posing in front of a grey backdrop.
Speaker Bio for Jeremy Thompson
Jeremy Thompson (he/him) is the Digital Processing Archivist at the University of Texas Libraries. In his role, he works cross-departmentally to support the preservation and access of born-digital and digitized archival collection material held at UT Libraries.
Talk: From Meme to Machine - How Our Gen Z Digital Preservation System has Come of Age
(he/him/his)
Manager, Metadata Services Unit
Yale Library
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Tim, a middle-aged white male with short, slightly graying hair and beard, flashes a friendly smile in black and white. Pictured from the shoulders up, he wears a spotted tie. Behind him is a blurred metal bookcase full of books.
Speaker Bio for Tim Thompson
Tim Thompson, an information professional with 10+ years of expertise in metadata operations, manages the Metadata Services Unit at Yale University. With master’s degrees in library science and data science, he specializes in metadata creation, analysis, and transformation across various standards. Since 2016, he has focused on linked data standards and semantic modeling for cultural heritage materials.
Talk: Text Embeddings for Entity Resolution and Name Disambiguation in the Library Catalog
Brandeis University
University at Buffalo
Speaker Bio for Shu Wan
Workshop: ChatGPT as Shortcut for Integrating Digital Humanities into the History Classroom
(he/they)
University of Nevada, Reno
Speaker Bio for Challen Wright
Talk: Inheriting Messy Metadata: Acquiring an Institutional Repository from Non-Librarians
(she/her/hers)
Lead Software Engineer
JSTOR Labs
Profile Image Description
Andromeda looks straight at the camera. She's a white woman with glasses, wavy brown hair, and a half-smile. A white-and-grey cat perches on her shoulder, unimpressed.
Speaker Bio for Andromeda Yelton
Andromeda Yelton is a librarian-flavored software engineer at JSTOR Labs. In the past she has written code for the Library of Congress, the Berkman Klein Center, the MIT Libraries, the Wikimedia Foundation, and bespoke knitting patterns, among other things. She's probably thinking about planes.
Talk: Why MARC is terrible but brilliant and you should be nice to yourself