I'm seeing a constant here regarding an index, archive, or Lie-brary @bifilarcoil cleverly coined. Frankly, I need it. My old computer doesn't even have a working fan any more LOL. I need to archive vids I need as evidence for posts but have no means to store them locally.

I also love the idea of mentoring. As I mentioned digging into some of the archival sources has been daunting to me. I'm sure it is to everyone to varying degrees. Being shown how specific archives work can really increase comfort levels for folks new to them.

I agree that AI and automation are perhaps the most significant technological advance of our age. I am confident that our work can be furthered by their careful application, and that also it can be furthered for us and not past us. Curation trails are great, because they lead us to new authors and sources - but it's important that we go there ourselves, because otherwise we don't get to those authors and sources. As long as such tools can be used to augment human capabilities instead of replacing them, I am a fervent believer in using them. I just haven't found many curation trails for manual curation, or bots that find us content to read and comment on. Humanity is the purpose of tech, irreplacable, even sacred in my view. All too often financialization dehumanizes people into mere products and profit centers. Warning shots across our bows.

As to research challenges, I think we largely agree that civilian journalists come to this from myriad perspectives, and with various interest levels, which is why I think it may be more useful to simply recognize outstanding contributions from time to time than to dictate foci. For specific research needs. I think the mentoring effort can go a long way to getting people digging the right holes.

Thanks for your insights.