"[5] A number of his best professional articles were collected in Magic and Hypersystems: Constructing the Information Sharing Library (2002).
As one review concluded, Billings "has been instrumental in guiding the library into the digital future over the past 25 years.
Reflecting a long-time interest in Arthur Conan Doyle, in 2006 he received the Morley-Montgomery Award[8] for his essay "The Materia Medica of Sherlock Holmes".
[9] Billings' most extensive literary studies involved two disparate authors who he suggested share a fascination with the Biblical Job, American novelist and essayist Edward Dahlberg (1900–1977)[10] and Anglo-West Indian novelist M. P. Shiel (1865–1947)[11] Billings helped gather a remarkable archive of Shiel's works and documents for the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center.
Billings extensively revised and expanded this material with much original research drawn from the Ransom Center archive and other sources.