I am the Content and Accessibility Strategist at Grand Valley State University Libraries in Allendale, Michigan. I design user interfaces and user interactions for our collection of websites. My research interests are usability, accessibility, and design ethics. Library Journal named me a “Mover and Shaker,” which led to many unfortunate dance-related jokes in the Reidsma household.
Masked by Trust: Bias in Library Discovery
Library discovery systems struggle with accuracy, relevance, and human biases, and these shortcomings have the potential to shape the academic research and worldviews of the students and faculty who rely on them. While human bias, commercial interests, and problematic metadata have long affected researchers’ access to information, algorithims in library discovery systems increase the scale of the negative effects on users, while libraries continue to promote their “objective” and “neutral” search tools.
Currently available in print from Library Juice Press. The book is also available as a PDF download under a Creative Commons CC-BY license (Thank you to Library Juice for agreeing to that!).
All my books are available for download under Creative Commons Licenses.