Against the Grain - The Podcast

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Peter Brantley , Director, Online Strategy, UC Davis Library (retired). Before joining UC Davis, Peter worked with Brewster Kahle and the Internet Archive, Open Library, the New York Public Library and with Dan Whaley of Hypothesis.   He's presented at the Charleston Conference with Gary Price...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Phillip Ball , Freelance Science Writer. Phillip spent over 20 years as an editor with the journal Nature and is a celebrated British science writer who has authored over 30 books on diverse topics like quantum physics, systems biology, alchemy, invisibility, and why music has an effect on us....

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Jonathan Grunert , Scholarly Publishing Librarian, University at Buffalo. Jonathan began his career by teaching high school immediately after college, until he realized that it wasn't the career for him. He decided to seek a higher education degree, and the first degree he landed on was library...

  Description for Show Notes : Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Harry Collins , Professor Emeritus, School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University. Harry is one of the most distinguished academics involved in the sociology of science and has authored 25 books throughout his career. He earned his master's in sociology from Essex...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Daniel Dollar , Associate University Librarian for Scholarly Resources, Yale University. Daniel started out by studying politics in the early 90's, going to Washington, D.C., bouncing around between jobs on Capitol Hill, and working for a senator from N.C. until a former staff director and a se...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Ulrich Herb , Head, Publication and Research Support, Saarland University Library. Ulrich has been based for over 20 years at Saarland University. He talks with Michael about being born and raised in Saarland (the smallest federal state in Germany), and growing up in a village directly at the R...

Full title: A Conversation with Elizabeth Gadd, Chair, INORMS Research Evaluation Group, and Head of Research Culture and Assessment, Loughborough University Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Elizabeth Gadd , Chair, INORMS Research Evaluation Group, and Head of Research Culture and Assessment, Loughborough University. Elizabeth...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Josh Cromwell , Scholarly Communications Manager, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries. Josh is author of the recent Charleston Briefings Institutional Repositories . He has a background in history, and when asked what the appeal of joining a library was to him, he says it merged two of...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Georgios Papadopoulos , Chairman and Founder, Atypon. Georgios was born in Thessaloniki, Greece, and says he started out wanting to study astrophysics, but a physicist talked him into studying math instead. In 1983, he had a professor that came from the U.S. who taught two classes in computer s...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Russell Michalak , Library Director, Goldey-Beacom College, and Founding Partner, Inclusive Knowledge Solutions. Russell has been immersed in libraries throughout his life. His mother was a librarian, and he kept coming back to librarianship despite an initial rebellion to pursue a library care...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Orland Hoeber , Professor and Head, Department of Computer Science, at University of Regina; Founder, Dilex Search. Orland says from an early age, he has always been interested in problem solving, trying to make sense of things and understand how things worked. He gravitated towards computing s...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Steve Smith , AI Gateway and MCP Pilot Advisory for Scholarly Publishers. Steve has enjoyed a wide-ranging academic publishing career, with half spent in book publishing and half spent in journal publishing, and has held senior roles at AIP Publishing, Frontiers, the American Psychological Asso...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Ben Lee , Assistant Professor, University of Washington Information School. Ben initially trained as an astrophysicist with a PhD in Human Computer Interaction, but he isn't out there looking for asteroids these days. He is currently an editor for Digital Humanities Quarterly and teaches an MLI...

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Zakayo Kjellstrom , Investigator, Swedish Agency for the Media, which " works to promote freedom of expression and diversity in the media market, where multiple voices are heard and consumers have access to a wide and accessible range of radio, television and news media."     Zakayo currently li...

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Jon Brassey , Founder, Trip Database. J on says he doesn't consider himself to be an entrepreneur, but a problem solver, who created the Trip Database, a medical question-and-answer service for practitioners that has been running for almost 30 years and contains over 125 million clinical article...

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Gary Price , Editor, LJ's InfoDOCKET and ARL Day in Review. Gary, a very well-known figure across the scholarly publishing industry, is a librarian, consultant, researcher and speaker who regularly provides important and timely news, updates and information. In this conversation, he talks with M...

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Allison Belan , Director for Strategic Innovation, Duke University Press. Allison has a background in English and Philosophy. In this conversation, she talks with Michael about her start in type setting, working on school newspapers and school literary magazines and then a school journal in coll...

Today's episode features guest host  Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Helen Bischoff , Coordinator of Liaison Services, University of Kentucky Libraries. In this conversation, Helen talks about her early experiences of working as a High School English teacher in Kentucky. She reflects on how overcrowding in the school caused her to leave her classroom during her...

The following interview is part of the 2025 Charleston Conference Leadership Interview Series. In this series, we sit down with leaders and innovators who are making a real difference in scholarly publishing, libraries, and the broader information world. Each conversation is a chance to hear firsthand how these decision makers tackle new challenges, rethink traditional models, and collaborate acro...

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with John Unsworth , Library Dean, English Professor Emeritus, University of Virginia. John is a distinguished humanities scholar and professor, and retired last September as University Librarian and Dean of Libraries at University of Virginia. He earned his PhD in English from the University of Virg...

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Stacey Greenwell , Librarian, Author and Instructional Designer.  Stacey has authored and co-authored several books on library practice, including Management Information for Professionals and Academic Librarianship, and she currently edits the open-access journal Practical Academic Librarianship...

Today's episode features guest host Michael Upshall (guest editor, Charleston Briefings) who talks with Rachel Caldwell , Academic Engagement, University of Massachusetts, Amhurst, and Robin Sinn , Director of Collections and Open Strategy, Iowa State University. Rachel and Robin are two librarians who co-founded the Library Partnership Rating which is a "collaborative and library-developed framew...

The following interview is part of the 2025 Charleston Conference Leadership Interview Series. In this series, we sit down with leaders and innovators who are making a real difference in scholarly publishing, libraries, and the broader information world. Each conversation is a chance to hear firsthand how these decision makers tackle new challenges, rethink traditional models, and collaborate acro...

The following interview is part of the 2025 Charleston Conference Leadership Interview Series. In this series, we sit down with leaders and innovators who are making a real difference in scholarly publishing, libraries, and the broader information world. Each conversation is a chance to hear firsthand how these decision makers tackle new challenges, rethink traditional models, and collaborate acro...

The following interview is part of the 2025 Charleston Conference Leadership Interview Series. In this series, we sit down with leaders and innovators who are making a real difference in scholarly publishing, libraries, and the broader information world. Each conversation is a chance to hear firsthand how these decision makers tackle new challenges, rethink traditional models, and collaborate acro...