Eleven chapter members came together for an informal virtual gathering led by Program Chair Lisa Sorenson. After brief announcements, we shared interesting upcoming and past projects and life events, then discussed various questions on indexing.
Announcements
- The ASI conference is coming up on June 10 and 11! https://asindexing.org/conference-2026/ Early bird rates are available through May 30th. Several PNW members are presenting sessions: Mary Stevens on meditation, Lisa Fedorak and Elizabeth Bartmess on macros, and Elizabeth Bartmess (along with co-presenter Michele Combs) on AI and indexing.
- We’ll be holding chapter elections in the fall. The elected positions are Chair, Program Chair, and Treasurer. Elizabeth (current Chair) notes that the Chair position is actually the easiest job—you show up to meetings and make sure someone takes notes, you send ASI a bullet-point list of chapter activities once a year when they request it, and in the fall you make sure people are nominated for chapter positions. Please reach out to Elizabeth (elizabeth.bartmess@gmail.com) or Lisa (sorensonindexing@gmail.com) if you’re potentially interested.
Indexing discussion
We also discussed AI. An indexer reported that a large academic publisher who had previously attempted to outsource indexing and then come back is now attempting to replace their indexers with AI + outsourcing, but other publishers (including a major tech publisher) specifically stipulate that indexers not use AI. Another indexer noted that she recently did an index for a Big 5 publisher where they added to the contract a stipulation that AI not be used in producing the index. We discussed the issue of (generative) AI being predictive in nature and lacking indexers’ trained judgment; it was also noted that more content providers are implementing CAPTCHAS to try to keep AI from scraping their sites. The upcoming AI conference will include two presentations on AI: one on using AI to develop macros and regular expressions, and one on ways to respond if asked what you offer over AI or if asked to edit or assess an AI-generated index.
We shared tips for getting work in specific areas. At smaller university presses, it’s easier to get in touch with an actual person, and the editors tend to know each other and are more likely to pass you to the correct person. The Association of University Presses also offers a grid listing specific presses by subject area: https://aupresses.org/resources/aupresses-subject-area-grid/ Another suggestion is to look at books that you like in the subject area and see who publishes them. If you are looking for books in that area that are quicker to index, one strategy is to look at those books in your library’s young adult nonfiction section, if they have one.
Mac’s Tahoe OS: several members have successfully upgraded to Tahoe and find that both Cindex and Acrobat continue to work without issues. You may get a warning about future incompatibility for some programs including Cindex; Open Cindex is aware of that and does not expect it to be an issue.