Life & Work with Valerie Karno of Pacific Palisades

Today we’d like to introduce you to Valerie Karno

Hi Valerie, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I was born and raised in Los Angeles, and have been involved in the creative arts (music, film, writing) since I was a child. Now, as a professor of literature, law, and library and information studies, I have studied for over two decades how feelings influence our everyday landscapes. With my J.D. from the University of California San Francisco Law School, and Ph.D. from the University of Southern California, I have taught courses in subjects ranging from affect theory to civility, and from the digital humanities to information ethics and policy.

Especially over the last ten years while I was Director of the Graduate School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Rhode Island, I have seen a steady decline in people’s mental health. Being amidst so many people struggling every day to find coping mechanisms, I wanted to create an intervention. I decided to help lead the way in creating a path for us all to live more humanely with digital culture. Since we are all on our devices so much of each day, I wanted to create a way for our devices to take how we are feeling into account. I wanted to enable our devices to attend to our moods, so that our humanity does not get lost in our interactions with laptops, mobile phones, ipads, and the myriad other devices we engage with daily. I believe our human emotions need to be factored into our experiences with our devices, so that we are more fully included while we engage with technology throughout the day.

So, Ambience Search™ was born as the first mood-based search engine. Ambience Search™ lets a person look for how they want to feel while they are gathering information from the internet. Ambience Search™ helps people find their desired mood.

I feel fortunate that my background in literature, the digital humanities, law, and library and information studies has led me to envision Ambience Search™.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Ambience Search™ is the first app I have ever created, so there has been a large and exciting learning curve for me in understanding all the steps involved in bringing this project to the public.
Luckily, my business partner Sam Gustman is a computer engineer, with considerable experience both in technology and in creating businesses, and so I have been able to lean on his technical and industry knowledge to implement my ideas. The smoothest parts of the road have been encountering the tremendous kindness of many people who offer advice and guidance. I have been so grateful for the people who have taken their time to think with me about the many facets of development and distribution. The struggles I have encountered have mostly been around time. Since I am a professional and a mother of school-aged children, I have had to learn how to be accepting of others and myself around timing. I think that struggles are opportunities for self-growth, so ultimately from creating a logo, to getting a patent, to being sure the app is working properly, creating Ambience Search™ has helped me to be an even more understanding world citizen.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am a tenured Associate Professor at the University of Rhode Island, and I am known for the ways in which I connect fields and people. With a J.D., Ph.D., I have a joint appointment both in the English Department, and the Graduate School of Library and Information Studies (GSLIS). My Ph.D. dissertation was about the field of Law and Literature, and much of the work I do is interdisciplinary. I specialize in the digital humanities, and have published articles and book reviews in a range of literary, legal, and library journals.

My current book project, contracted by the American Library Association, is on library wellness programming and education. I have interviewed over forty libraries throughout the United States to find out what sort of wellness programming they offer across eight areas like social, emotional, financial, physical, intellectual, and environmental wellness. My findings will be coming out in the book soon. Additionally, I have run several grants. I ran the “Media Smart Libraries” IMLS grant while I was the Director of GSLIS, as well as a grant from the Infosys Foundation where I helped bring “Family Code Night” to children and their parents in Rhode Island libraries.

I am especially proud of my work for the last decade as Director of GSLIS, where I led us through the pandemic and nearly doubled our enrollment as I provided greater access to our program. I am known for my imaginative approaches to problem solving, my visions for the future, my inventive courses, and my strong dedication to my work. I was honored by The Rhode Island Library Association with an award in 2024 for “Outstanding Contributions to the Profession” for my work with students and libraries over the last ten years.

I am deeply invested in how we are in the world, in addition to what we “do” in the world. I work to promote wellness, so much so that I have taught yoga nidra, a deep relaxation technique, to students, faculty, and staff at the university. I also truly love teaching, and earlier in my career I won the URI Teaching Excellence Award after having been nominated by students.

I have been invited to speak as a keynote speaker or panelist at numerous universities, and I often speak on topics related to future trends and sustainability. For me, living is learning, and learning is living. I strive always to be learning and creating, towards making helpful contributions in the world.

I created Ambience Search™ to make a useful imprint in our world, and help alleviate some of the suffering I have been seeing in our communities. Having spent many years studying and teaching the digital humanities, my goal with Ambience Search™ is to humanize digital culture, let us all be better reflected in our technology each day, and improve our mental states in that process.

So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
I think the world is at its best when everyone gets to fulfill their potential.
What matters to me is living in the world with kindness, love, creativity, thoughtfulness, playfulness, invention, dedication, and excellence.
I want our current and future generations to be able to cope with challenges and resiliently recover from hurdles.
Ambience Search™ has been created to find ourselves everyday in our technology, to achieve these goals which matter to me.

Pricing:

• Ambience Search has a 7 day free trial and then is just 99 cents a month after that, so that people can easily access it.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://ambiencesearch.com
• Instagram: @ambiencesearch
• Other: https://drvaleriekarno.com

Image Credits
Citrus Studios