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Speakers

Keynotes

Profile image for Nikko Stevens

(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.

Profile image for Ruth Kitchin Tillman

(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

Speaker Bio for Greg Albers

Workshop: Hands-On Digital Publishing Workshop with Quire

(They/He)

Emory University

(He/Him)

California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt

(he/him)

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.

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Digital Preservation Coordinator

University of Texas Libraries

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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

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(he/him/his)

Los Alamos National Laboratory

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Harvard University - Library Technology Services

Speaker Bio for Sharon Clapp

Workshop: Shinobi Skills: Mastering the Art of Prompt Engineering

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(he/him)

Asst. Director, Library Software Engineering

Princeton University Library

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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

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(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

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(she/her)

Systems Librarian

Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine

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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

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(she/her/hers)

Software Developer

UCLA

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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

Speaker Bio for Erin Cecele Dunigan

Workshop: Hands-On Digital Publishing Workshop with Quire

University of Utah

(she/her)

University of Calgary

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University of Rochester

Speaker Bio for Cary Gordon

Workshop: Discover the new Islandora and ISLE

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University of Texas Libraries

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GBH Media Library & Archives

Speaker Bio for Ryan "Harpo" Harbert

Talk: Whisper at High Volumes: How to transcribe an Archive

(他)

Free Ebook Foundation

Speaker Bio for Eric Hellman

Talk: Making an accessible Winnie-the-Pooh

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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)

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(she/her/hers)

Digital Content Metadata Specialist

Johns Hopkins Sherdian Libraries

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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

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(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.”)

(he/him/his)

NC State University Libraries

(he/him)

GBH Archives

Speaker Bio for Owen King

Talk: Cataloging Video via Computer Vision

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New York Public Library/Brooklyn Public Library

Speaker Bio for Charlotte Kostelic

Talk: MARC record validation with Python and Pydantic

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(she/her/hers)

UCLA

University of Texas at San Antonio

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Pennsylvania State University

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(she/her/hers)

Head, Digital Media Software Development

Indiana University

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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

Eric is a librarian who works at the University of Notre Dame.

Librarian

University of Notre Dame

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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.

Workshop: Modern Alchemy: Hands-On with the Distant Reader

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(they/them)

Metadata Analyst

University of Texas at Austin

Profile Image Description

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

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Lead Librarian for UX Strategy

NC State University Libraries

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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

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NC State University Libraries

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University at Albany

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(He/Him)

Technology Engagement Librarian

University of Utah

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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

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(He/Him)

Library IT Operations Fellow

Princeton University

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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)

(He/His)

Northwestern University Libraries

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Brandeis University

Speaker Bio for Kyeongmin Rim

Talk: Cataloging Video via Computer Vision

(she/they)

University of Michigan

University of Texas at San Antonio

Profile image for Bess Sadler

(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

David in glasses and smiling stands against fall foliage in a grey sweater.

(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

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Pennsylvania State University

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University of Texas Libraries

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Yale University Library

Brandeis University

Speaker Bio for Marc Verhagen

Talk: Cataloging Video via Computer Vision

University at Buffalo

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University of Nevada, Reno

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.

(she/her/hers)

Lead Software Engineer

JSTOR Labs

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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