AI Interest Group for Libraries, Archives, and Museums
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Metadata, Cataloging, and Technical Services

On November 17, 2023, we held the third session of the AI Interest Group. The topic was Metadata, Cataloging, and Technical Services.

Aaron Choate, the Director of Research and Strategy at UT Libraries and the Chair of the AI Interest Group, led the panel discussion.

We were honored to have the following panelists contribute their thoughts and experiences:

  • Corey Halaychik, Head of Content Management at UT Libraries
  • Devon Murphy, Metadata Analyst at UT Libraries
  • Olivia Solis, Metadata Coordinator at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History  
  • Albert Palacios, Digital Scholarship Coordinator for the Benson Latin American Collection and Professor of Digital Libraries and Historical Museums at the UT Austin School of Information

The panelists engaged in a rich and informative discussion on the integration of AI in metadata and technical services. We delved into not only the diverse applications of AI in this field but also the critical considerations necessary for its thoughtful and effective implementation. We were thrilled with the exchange of ideas and viewpoints, and look forward to continuing this discussion in our future sessions! If you are interested in attending, please fill out a form on our Events page.

Here is a selection of the materials we distributed in advance of the third meeting:

  • Topic: Metadata, Cataloging, and Technical Services
  • Date: November 17, 2023

Videos

  • Zoom recording: Intelligence Augmentation: Effective Human-AI Interaction to Supercharge Scientific Research 
    • Link: https://utexas.app.box.com/s/9fdzv93g6htc46w1hsesci06475pgtp9
    • Speaker: Daniel Weld, Chief Scientist at Semantic Scholar
    • Hosted by The Forum for Artificial Intelligence (FAI) at UT Austin 
    • Duration: 01:10:08
    • Date: October 27, 11:00 AM
    • Abstract: Recent advances in Artificial Intelligence are powering revolutionary interactive tools that will transform the capabilities of everyone, especially knowledge workers. But in order to create synergy, where humans’ augmented intelligence and creativity reaches its true potential, we need improved interaction methods. AI presents several challenges to existing UI paradigms, including nondeterminism, inexplicable behavior, and significant errors (such as LLM hallucinations). We discuss principles and pitfalls for effective human-AI interaction, grounding our discussion in Semantic Scholar – a free, open, AI-powered scientific discovery platform aimed at augmenting the intelligence of human researchers.
  • Question Answering Leveraging Large Language Models using RAG
    • This is a good video to understand more about Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG)
    • Duration: 00:33:00.    
    • Speaker: Karim Mohraz
    • Hosted by SAP, which is a German company that makes enterprise software
    • Date: October 5, 2023
    • What is retrieval-augmented generation?(IBM)
    • Documents can be converted into vectors, stored in a database, and used to ‘ground’ LLMs so that they don’t wildly invent information (also known as ‘hallucinating’)
  • 2023 ai4Libraries Conference: AI in Library Technical Services
    • Duration: 01:00:05
    • Description: AI and Library Technical Services (Panel) 
    • Date: October 19, 2023
    • Hosted by: Corey Halaychik, Head of Content Management, University of Texas Libraries 
    • Panelists: Iona Minshew, Head of Resource Management at the University of Texas at Austin Libraries; Ingrid Reiche, Digital Metadata Librarian at the University of Calgary Professor; Sever Bordeianu, Director of Technical Services and Outreach Librarian
  • 2023 ai4libraries Conference: Lightning Talks (AI for All)
    • Duration: 01:33:42
    • Date: October 19, 2023 
    • Transforming a Library Space from Concept to Reality – Dawn Frood, Florida Atlantic University 
    • Using Research Assistant AI for Finding Scholarly Articles – Allison Faix and Samantha Duncan, Coastal Carolina University
    • Leveraging AI tools for automating metadata extraction – Kristian Allen, UCLA
    • Moles and Martians: A New, LLM-based Library Search – Tim Spalding, LibraryThing (00:48:00)
    • Starting the Conversation: Enriching Collection Access and Use with Generative AI at Northwestern University Libraries – Brendan Quinn, Northwestern University
    • “Generative AI, Intellectual Property, and Marginalized Groups: How Libraries Can Minimize Harm to Marginalized Populations” – Raven Davis; Kristen Brown, Georgia Tech Library
    • These are all really interesting.  My personal favorite was the talk by Brendan Quinn (01:02:45), they’re doing some extraordinary work at Northwestern.  -HM 

Websites, Papers, Other

Linked data and Metadata Projects for Innovation Inspiration: 

  • LUX: Yale Collections Discovery 
    • “Mission Statement: Revealing the cultural heritage collections of Yale University to the world, LUX: Yale Collections Discovery provides a unified gateway to the holdings of Yale’s museums, archives, and libraries. This transformative service enables users to identify, access, and engage with items of interest within Yale’s physical and digital collections. It also uncovers relationships among items, inviting users to explore additional materials across collections.” (About LUX)

Recent Conference:  ASIS&T 2023 (Association of Information Science and Technology)

Policies, Values, Ethics

  • ResponsibleAI
    • Ongoing project to collect case studies of AI usage and challenges in libraries/archives.

An exciting new development on the UT Austin Campus  

  • Vista: A New AI-Focused Supercomputer for the Open Science Community
    • Link to press release (Faith Singer, November 13, 2023) 
    • Coming to the Texas Advanced Computing Center at The University of Texas at Austin in early 2024.

Thank you to Devon Murphy for contributing to the materials we sent out this month!