An email from the Modern Language Association, abbreviated to "Modern Language Ass."

They gotta do something about this abbreviation.

A digital thermometer reading 83.4° F

This is a very normal temperature for a professor’s office to be, right?

I believe these markings are provided to indicate important passages?

Moving forward, I will refer to books of fiction as “so-called novels.” Despite all the hype from industry shills, there’s nothing “novel” about the genre at all. So-called novels have existed for hundreds of years.

Interesting! If you don't already know about the Dickinson copyright drama, you might find it relevant. Also curious how this relates to the common association b/t close reading and poetry: ideal genre for close reading, but more copyright problems b/c of the "% reproduced" rule...

V short notice, but I'll be reading some poems by Marie Howe and talking about them at the Georgetown public library today at 2pm. Come by if you're in the area!

Waiting for some tiresome nerd to explain why, actually, this news once again confirms the generative grammar IS correct...

The more I learn about machine learning in general and transformers in particular — and while I have a long way to go, I've learned a LOT — the more I believe that none of it really ought to work. Slamming a set of matrices with training data and demanding with calculus that they figure it out…

Send link/name if you can find it! I am professionally interested.

h/t @mkirschenbaum.bsky.social for the link

It's been a circular journey: Some key machine-learning techniques now used in all big AI models (heard of gradient descent?) were developed in the late 1980s to do handwriting recognition for the postal service. I tell this story in the intro to my book, which you can read...sometime next year!

The Writing Is on the Wall for Handwriting Recognition One of the hardest problems in digital humanities has finally been solved

This post confirms something I discuss in my book project: large, consumer-facing AI models now outdo specialty apps for handwriting recognition. Cohen doesn't mention that they can also tell which handwriting looks more "graceful," "angry," etc. newsletter.dancohen.org/archive/the-...

Yeah I’ve found it very worth the effort. Can get into an “every Tuesday” routine with someone rather quickly, and squash at least has been a great way to make random interesting (non-academic) friends.

Hard same. After a very “fuck sports” youth, this is why I now like squash so much. Chasing a ball and trying to win a game are way more diverting than solo cardio. I think tennis or basketball would be just as fun. Makes me hate the bike/run days when there’s nobody to play.

This is starting to feel like a real thing...

I mean…

Padded envelope with “University of Hell” stamped on it.

Kinda digging the name of this press.

Shame on ABC and Disney.

Your DMs are closed to me here, but I just emailed what I think is your gmail address. If you don't have an email from me, please send me a quick note...first name dot last name at gmail. Hope we can connect soon!

Hi! Can’t figure out how to DM you here but will send an email this afternoon.

Maybe they'll indict a ham sandwich, but not the hero who throws it!

Column | ChatGPT is an energy guzzler. These things you’re doing are worse. AI services have earned a reputation as energy-hungry beasts. But what about the other emissions in our digital lives?

Given that a very viral, very misleading story from WaPo helped to fuel the whole "AI kills the climate" thing in the first place, it's nice to see this more...informed piece from them. www.washingtonpost.com/climate-envi...

New white paper: “Measuring the environmental impact of delivering AI at Google Scale”

Curious what people think of this.

services.google.com/fh/files/mis...

Is Michael Camille's book, Image on the Edge, still the definitive study of funny/crude marginalia in medieval manuscripts? e. g. for lulz . . .

- Old old: your phone rings in the movie
- New old: it’s in your pocket with the flashlight on

Did the scary thing! Wrote the first paragraph of the book. The first word of this book is “In.” Stay tuned for the rest . . .

…Dan had had not invoked “Mr. Penis” since age 8, when he falsified a summer read-a-thon form at his childhood public library in order to get a personal pan pizza.

Wait, all of you people have read FIFTY books?

I for one am doing my utmost to say the smartest things on page 1 of my book.

Academics! I have space this summer to take on indexing work. Please message me if interested!