President’s Message, November 2025

Dear friends

We’re almost there! It’s nearly time for the 88th Annual Meeting. When I began my term as President I said that I wished for a year of conversations. The theme of this year’s Annual Meeting is Difficult Conversations: The Role of Information Science in the Age of Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence and there are so many interesting and fruitful conversations promised on the ethics and applications of AI within the information sciences. Some of these investigate what may be seen as challenges to the way we have traditionally done things, looking at the future of academic writing, student assessment, information organisation, and information retrieval, whilst others are on the potentials of new technologies. The sheer wealth of papers on this topic shows what major contributions Library and Information Science can make to this important area of public and professional discourse.

Alongside these we see many conversations that align with our values of Collaboration, Empowerment, Inclusivity, Impact, and Stewardship, including contributions on indigenous data stewardship, human-human and human-AI collaboration, black trans mens’ information practices, queer theory, data reuse, digital empowerment, and crisis informatics. You are being spoilt for choice and will need a Tardis to attend everything you wish to hear.

I am particularly keen to view the posters and hear about the new directions being forged in our field. If you are new to ASIS&T and presenting in this session, then you will be particularly welcome. Often the most exciting new ideas come from those new to research or new to publishing and it is always so energising to hear these new-est contributions.

Last week at Strathclyde we celebrated our graduation ceremony where our latest graduates in Information and Library Studies marked their entry into a new professional career. Their careers may be very different to ours due to the AI phenomena that we will present and discuss shortly. However, the core values and commitment to public and professional service that underpins much of what we do in Library and Information Science is evident in their thinking about our field and it’s so heartening to hear them talk about Library and Information Science as an aspirational profession to join. As I was returning my (overdue) public library books yesterday I could see our training in action and the value it creates to a local community. Much of what we do is not so visible but forms local, national, and international information infrastructures that facilitate societal progression. At the Annual Meeting and the Virtual Satellite Meeting in December we shall share conversations on all aspects of our important work.

I am delighted that Professor Ina Fourie will give this year’s President’s Lecture at the Virtual Satellite Meeting on ‘Information behaviour as a research lens for agility in change enablement, transition and flow – workplace and everyday life’ looking at change processes from an information behaviour lens and viewing information behaviour as transformative and future-oriented. I encourage everyone to attend this virtual lecture.

At the Annual Meeting we will also have the chance to discuss the new Strategic Plan. This has been the result of a large amount of effort, including from many of you, and it promises to be a fruitful – and appropriately challenging – set of actions for the next three years.

As I handover to your incoming President Maria Bonn, I wish to thank her for her enormous service to ASIS&T already in leading this new plan, to the current Board, to Lydia for being on top of everything and being so responsive, and to all our colleagues at GMP for all they do for us. And to thank you again for all you do for ASIS&T, the LIS community and users of our services.

Best wishes

Ian