#nypl digital collections

[petsincollections]

Bears. Alexander Anderson scrapbooks

The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library. "Bears." The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1794 - 1870. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/f9030b00-c5d5-012f-f33d-58d385a7bc34

[kingsbridgelibraryteens]

Literary NYC: A Stone Book Reader in Washington Heights!

This creature, one of several that are either called “gargoyles” or “architectural grotesques,” depending on which source you’re using, can be found on the outside of an apartment building on the corner of W 181st Street and Fort Washington Avenue. Just find the corner that has the Hudson View Restaurant … and then LOOK UP:

You can learn more about the history of this building, known as the Nathan Hale Apartments, back when it looked even fancier, in the New York Public Library’s Digital Collections!

[agmarietv]

One of my favorite people to turn on while I'm cooking...Ms. Maxine Sullivan, photographed possibly in the early 1940s.

Sullivan sang with everyone from Claude Thornhill to Louis Armstrong to Jimmie Lunceford. She also sang with her husband of two years, John Kirby, and had an orchestra of her own.

You can listen to the smooth vocals of Maxine Sullivan on this week's episode of WINE-DOWN SUNDAYS - TONIGHT at 9PM EST on AG Marie TV.

[New York Public Library Digital Collections]

[girderednerve]

Low quality books that appear to be AI generated are making their way into public libraries via their digital catalogs, forcing librarians who are already understaffed to either sort through a functionally infinite number of books to determine what is written by humans and what is generated by AI, or to spend taxpayer dollars to provide patrons with information they don’t realize is AI-generated.

With Hoopla, librarians have to opt into Hoopla’s entire catalog, then pay for whatever their customers choose to borrow from that catalog. The only way librarians can limit what Hoopla books their customers can borrow is by setting a limit on the price of books. For example, a library can use Hoopla but make it so their customers can only borrow books that cost the library $5 per use.

“Investigating these authors, their book covers, their social media, etc takes A LOT OF TIME, especially with the volume of questionable material increasing month to month (and that's not including the sheer amount of legitimate books published each month in adult fiction that I'm looking at),” one librarian who asked to remain anonymous so she could talk openly about her job, told me. “Is it the best use of my time doing this work on top of my other duties when customers may or may not care? And with the rising multitudes of AI generated content, will there come a point where it just ‘is what it is?’”

This type of low quality, AI generated content, is what we at 404 Media and others have come to call AI slop. Librarians, whose job it is in part to curate what books their community can access, have been dealing with similar problems in the publishing industry for years, and have a different name for it: vendor slurry. While the term now encompasses what seems like AI-generated content as well, it predates the rise of generative AI, and also refers to the glut of low quality, often self-published ebooks or book “summaries” that are common on Hoopla. As some librarians told me, the sheer quantity of books in Hoopla’s service makes it seem more valuable because it offers such a large number of books, but in reality that number is misleadingly inflated by this slurry.

Several of the librarians I talked to said that they are worried about discussing [the problems raised by Hoopla's weak, unclear selection policies, including the 2022 inclusion of explicitly white nationalist texts,] because of the growing hostility towards libraries and groups like Moms for Liberty demanding that books about LGBTQ rights, race, and ethnicity be removed from libraries. One the one hand, librarians want to curate their collections and make sure their patrons are getting access to quality information. On the other hand, they don’t want people to think that they are trying to censor what materials patrons can access in way that’s comparable to what organizations like Moms for Liberty want. None of the librarians I talked to suggested the AI-generated content needed to be banned from Hoopla and libraries only because it is AI-generated. It might have its place, but it needs to be clearly labeled, and more importantly, provide borrowers with quality information.

[snowrassa]

i am NORMAL about pretty boy lancelots

[gradling]

Literally just because it took me forever to find the colorful fingerguns John Mandeville, have it here! From NYPL, Spencer Collection MS. 037, f1v.

[image-junkie]

Alen MacWeeney, New York City Subway, 1977. Gelatin Silver Prints. The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Photography Collection, New York Public Library Digital Collections.

[cuties-in-codices]

cute creature

in a book of hours, france, ca. 1450-1500

source: New York Public Library, Manuscripts and Archives Division, MssCol 2557, MA 50, fol. 95r

[heaveninawildflower]

Designs ( circa 1900) by M. P. Verneuil, G. Auriol et A. Mucha taken from 'Combinaisons ornementales se multipliant à l'infini à l'aide du miroir' (Ornamental combinations multiplying infinitely with the help of the mirror).

Images and text information courtesy NYPL Digital Collection.

[newyorkthegoldenage]

Would you happen to have any images of the High Bridge?

See below. The bridge, which is for pedestrians only, crosses the Harlem River from Manhattan to the Bronx.

The two photos above are from 1923.

The photo above, taken from the water tower, is from 1934. Photographer was Percy Loomis Sperr.

Finally, the postcard above, by the Union News Co., is from sometime between 1915 and 1930.

All photos from NYPL

If you want to see more, this is a link to the NY Public Library's digital collections, which you can search.

[drmopp1966]

ik only like three people care about all these she loves me posts

but i found more stuff!!

https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/search/index?utf8=✓&keywords=She+loves+me

nearly 200 photos from the original broadway production!!!

the set is ✨GORGEOUS✨

[tedhead]

Maggie Smith in the stage production New Faces of 1956, via the NYPL Digital Collections.

[lonesomedreamer]

Nichelle Nichols in rehearsal for a 1961 production of the musical “Kicks and Co” in Chicago

Open images in a new tab or click through to the NYPL Digital Collections page for much larger/HD versions (and more pictures)!

[flickeringflame216]

Floral Valentine's Day postcards from the NYPL Digital Collection

[gradientdescent-does-it-all]

I don’t see why art practice should be boring, hmm?

Study referencing another of the incredible series of promotional photos for 1978 Dracula starring Jeremy Brett and Margaret Whitton. Bless the NYPL digital collections for preserving this important piece of theatrical history.