Our readings this week dealt largely with the process of designing a web page for a digital library and/or archives, how to reach out to an interested audience, and possible uses of an online archive using the Old Bailey as an example.
In our first Cohen and Rosenzweig chapter for this week entitled Designing for the Digital Web, the authors cover some of the basics of how to design a good web page for a digital library/archive. What is problematic about this chapter is that what amounts to a well designed web page is somewhat based on the opinion of the person looking at the web page.
The main advice of Cohen and Rosenzweig is to make sure that text and images retain the character of the original documents while at the same being easy to view and read. Another equally important issue with a web site representing a digital collection is to make sure the mission and purpose of the website is stated clearly in an easy to find part of the web page for new users. http://chnm.gmu.edu/digitalhistory/designing/5.php
The second chapter of the digital history book for this week focuses on building an audience for a digital collection. This can be done with both old fashioned methods of promotion as well as new methods of promotion that have emerged with the World Wide Web.
As the authors point out some sites are fortunate enough to automatically get free promotion through their role. Web sites that contain government records will automatically get a certain amount of attention if they contain information that is commonly accessed by the public. The authors mentioned the 9/11 Digital Archives (http://911digitalarchive.org/) which received a lot of publicity from newspapers like USA Today due to its subject matter.
However most digital databases are not lucky enough to receive this kind of publicity. Certainly publicity from a mainstream media outlet (newspaper or TV) would be of enormous benefit, but for historical subject matter this isn't always possible. However the Internet has provided a new outlet for publicity particularly in the form of blogs which allow historical databases to generate their own advertising and connect with like minded people/organizations who might be interested in the material contained in a digital database. http://chnm.gmu.edu/digitalhistory/audience/index.php http://digitalhistoryhacks.blogspot.com/search?q=a+naive+bayesian+in+old+bailey
The ease of accessing information via the World Wide Web instead of in person at an archive and the advantage of having digital copies of documents/artifacts available in order to reduce handling of the physical copies has led to a large number of online databases for a wide range of material. http://www.arts-humanities.net/project http://oedb.org/library/features/250-plus-killer-digital-libraries-and-archives http://oedb.org/library/features/250-plus-killer-digital-libraries-and-archives
Digital databases can be based around a geographical area or in the case of the Old Bailey archive based around a specific record series. The record series in this case are all the court cases that went through London's central criminal court (Old Bailey) from 1673-1913. http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/
As both the Digital History from Below and the Teaching with the Old Bailey Article show, the Old Bailey archive alone produces a wealth of potential educational value for classrooms at all levels as well as scholarly research. https://uhra.herts.ac.uk/dspace/bitstream/2299/38/1/102846.pdf http://ancarett.com/?p=157
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