DV: A Walkthrough

Holy Cow!  I think it worked!! So in Quicktime I had to export it to the web, and it saved it in a couple of different formats that I think helped the process. Also I used the "cut" tool on Quicktime to bring it down to 15 minutes (where as really I had rambled more at the beginning and at the end).

This was my third time through, and I was VERY surprised at how long it took me to get through all of the information even though I knew pretty well where I was going.  Thankfully this isn't "Take 24".

I've got a little bit at the end about the future of data visualization. Check it.

test movie

Apparently the movie I made for the assignment is too long.
Boo that.

"Digital Dualism"

Unreality:

Voltaire famously said, "History is a pack of lies we play on the dead." While that certainly rolls off the tongue, it also points at a fundamental truth about history. It is constructed. Histories are a construction (or a reconstruction, if you consider that what is "real" is a construction of the person and perception).

Discussion of the real versus the un-real on the interwebs follows a similar set of arguments. There exists ongoing arguments about the reality of the web, and the differences between a virtual life and IRL (In Real Life). Writer Nathan Jurgenson has written a thoughtful piece on these distinctions.

He argues that what is online is real, because it depends on the real people with their real histories and actions, creating it. I agree, but just tend to see the opposite. Jurgenson say both the digital and IRL are real, and I would argue that both the digital and IRL are somewhat unreal. I'm not arguing a Platonic theory of forms or anything. I believe there is a physical world, but human perception creates/constructs what is real.

Let's look at Professor Charlie Evan's 1897 "Plan de Saint-Pétersbourg," a map of the often renamed St. Petersburg, Russia (not Florida. Not that I've been to the Russian city, but I can assure you, those cities are very different. Maybe that's my first discovery looking at this map!). Professor Evan's difficult scanning in a large format map begins to open discussion of the problematic digital  reconstruction.

Problems:

1. digitizing tools

There are many different ways that one can begin to digitize material for the web, and depending on what you are digitizing and for what purpose, different tools should be used.

2. file type

Again, how you are using the information will begin to determine the type of digitization file. Evan's map, to be clearly viewed and utilized by students, would need to have a good resolution--keeping most of the information from the original. Obviously things like text, images, audio, or video require different file types.

3. accessability

Do you want to share that information? Or only to present it to folks?

3. costs

There are a lot of costs associated with a digitization project--person doing the digitization, time spent, tools for digitization, and as always the bandwidth costs. Just for this map reproduction, Evans had to scan multiple sections of the map, and then using Photoshop, stitch together the pieces to create a coherent whole.

Other Uses:

If combined with Google maps, this map from 1897 could really begin to highlight the changes of St. Petersburg over time. One can see the creation and destruction of streets, bridges, buildings, parks. As Google map shows historical spots and museums, the user could see buildings from 1897 re-appropriated for national museums. Also, in conjunction with Google maps, one is able to access 3D street views--a unique experience for someone who has never visited the city. GIS opens an almost infinite realm of possibilities, layering different historical data on top of the maps. One could see how epidemics or revolts spread through the city. It does get a bit complicated if the user has great the shift data files GIS maps.

1897 "Plan de Saint-Pétersbourg" Observations:

Like most major European cities, St. Petersburg lies on a major river, the Neva River. It is split into some major islands, as the Neva splits its route to Neva Bay.

The French letterings and words on the Russian map, show the influence on Russsian culture and highlights the connections between eastern and western Europe.

The map itself represents the division of St. Petersburg 1897 into twelve police districts. I don't know enough about Russian in 1897 to know why that's important, but I'm sure there is a reason.

The fewer, grid-like streets in the outer police districts, show new growth on the outskirts of the historical city, probably brought on by population booms in the mid-1800s, as well as the industrial revolution. Possibly, those fewer, grid-like streets are more industrial areas.

St. Petersburg in 1897 had three major railroad stations (one on the north side of the Neva, and two on the south connecting Moscow to the industrial, port city).

There are a number of parks located throughout the city.

There is a fortress, which seems to be right in the center of the oldest part of the city.

The "Cimètiere de Wolkow" (a cemetery is located in the southeastern portion of the map, far on the outskirts of the city--a good location for a cemetery). There is another on the Ile de Vassiliovstrov and a Catholic Cemetery in the north-eastern corner--leading me to suspect that Catholics were a minority in St. Petersburg at the turn of the century. Cimetiere de St. Mitrophane is located south of the Varsov train station.

The slaughterhouses (abattoirs) are just east of the Varsov station.

I suspect the Ile de Vassiliostrov, contains the ports and harbors.

Four bridges cross the Grande Neva, and a fifth looks like it's being built.

Two bridges cross the Petite Neva, a smaller branch of the main river.

Two bridges cross the Grande Nevka, the northern, large branch of the Neva River.

Two bridges cross the Moyenne Nevka.

Three bridges cross the Petite Nevka.

And one bridge crosses the isthmus between the Petite and Moyenne Nevka.

Chapter Seven: Owning the Past?

Did you copy this right?

What Rosenzweig and Cohen (seriously, I'm going to start calling them Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, my brain cannot wrap around their names!!) really seem to be telling is that it is almost impossible to know whether a work (since 1923) still has an existing copy right or not, and for them it really doesn't seem to matter. They don't exactly let historians off the hook in allowing for the "fair use" of copyrighted work, but they like others (( )) make strong arguments for historians to utilize the "fair use" argument or that it will disappear entirely. They also offhandedly say that the keepers of the copyright are not necessarily looking to come after lowly, poor historians working on the web, and that there are certainly exceptions being an educator and making educational resources available (although there certainly is a difference between working in a gated community for students only, and publishing a website for the wide world to see). 

There is certainly a tension between academics aggressively protecting their own works, and then on the turn around trying to use other works. Although, and I think Cohen and Rosenzweig point this out, that really historians and other academics are afraid of plagiarism and having their ideas stolen, not the accredited, cited use of their works. By aggressively defend their works, it flies in the face of the "educator's exceptionalism." It also devalues the idea that education IS and CAN ONLY BE from a collective and sharing community.

If we just think for a minute about what education is, we find that teachers and other educators are sharing their own ideas to students and learners who take that information and synthesize it in new and exciting ways, making it their own -- that they can then share.

The rules of "fair use" are (AND ALL MUST BE MET, NOT JUST ONE):

• “The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes” (nonprofit educational uses are more likely to be fair as are those involving criticism, commentary, and parody); 
• “The nature of the copyrighted work” (uses of creative and unpublished works are less likely to be fair; uses of factual, published, and out-of-print works are more likely to be fair); 
• “The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole” (the smaller and less “central” the portion used, the more likely it is to be fair); 
• “The effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work” (using out-of-print works and works for which there is no permissions market is more likely to be fair). 

Some of the exceptions that educators can use are:

"As such, the TEACH Act offers what one legal scholar calls “the best legislative solution to the barriers that copyright law imposes on online education that educators can hope to achieve in the near future.” But on the other hand, the law subjects you to some significant and stringent limitations. For example, only accredited nonprofit institutions qualify, access must be limited to enrolled students in the context of “mediated instructional activities,” and institutions must take steps to “reasonably prevent” the unauthorized retention and dissemination of copyrighted works presented online."

The provide a number of quick and easy resource as starting places to see if a work is covered by copyright law.

http://www.copyright.cornell.edu/training/Hirtle_Public_Domain.htm#Footnote_1
http://www.unc.edu/~unclng/public-d.htm

One of the things that I certainly noticed. which dated the text, was the discussion of audio podcasts. These are free to the internet, and are of particular importance I think for my project. What I'm thinking about doing is a website that is a "Scientific Revolution" online information and lecture resource. Something that I can use one week, in my Western Civ survey course, but that can be expanded.

We were talking last week about having a whole website designed around a course, with links, lectures, audio, video right there. And more specifically taking that and making an app out of it for a whole semester course, filled with units one would then work through. Certainly there are going to be copyright issues there. I was already thinking about composing emails to the podcasts I use most often and asking permission, but another thing that I got from this chapter was:

Better to beg for forgiveness, rather than ask for permission.

The Elements of (Web) Style

Site Design Basics

Is there a web design manifesto like Strunk and White's Elements of Style? I thought that I had one found at The Elements of Style Blog. But no, I must search on.


Web Style Guide
I didn't like this one.  It has too many design elements with twelve.  This one does have some good ideas though, that some of the others don't have. This are ideas that you want to begin to think about before you begin to build that site--that are not as obvious as a design element like a color palate--but are vital for the functioning of a good website.

1. process
2. universal usability
3. information architecture
4. interface design
5. site structure -- (I think this is the one that is really important
                              that the other design elements are NOT terribly
                              explicit about.)
6. page structure
7. page design
8. typography
9. editorial style
10. forms and applications
11. graphics
12. mulitmedia

My Ink Blog

So this one is the same list that comes from The Non-Designer's Web Book, that Rosenzweig and Cohen reference. 

1. contrast
2. repetition
3. alignment
4. proximity

Digital Web Magazine

I actually think that these five design elements. They are more helpful than the four listed previously (but truly include those).

1. balance               -- (alignment)
2. rhythm                --(proximity - movement between text, images,
                                   and white spaces)
3. proportion
4. dominance          -- (contrast - both in color, space, size)
5. unity                    -- (repetition)

ConversionXL

This is one that I found. I liked these. It used good images. Got some very good ideas also, but maybe the Gestalt Design Laws got a little to intense. Also the names of these don't necessarily identify what you are looking for, so you have to know that Hick's Law is, or Fitt's Law.

1. visual hierarchy
2. divine proportions
3. Hick's Law     --every choice require addition time for a decision
4. Fitt's Law       --time it takes to move to an area is because of the
                             distance away and its size
5. Rule of Thirds -- use a 3x3 grid to help organize
6. Gestalt Design Laws -- people see the whole before each part
                            --Law of Proximity
                            --Law of Similarity
                            --Law of Closure
                            --Law of Symmetry
                            --Law of Common Fate
                           --Law of Continuity
7. White space and clean design
8. Occam's Razor -- the simplest solution is usually the best

Site Design Analysis

I am going to review the HOS sites I discussed in the previous post for their "elements of style." And perhaps, I should keep in mind my Strunk and White elements while I'm at it.

The Galileo Project
balance                -- pretty good
rhythm                 -- simple, good
proportion            -- proportions pretty good, would like the 
                               "reading" text to be a little bit bigger
dominance           -- color palate is great, but the text is NOT a
                                dominant color, images just big enough to 
                                contribute to the text
unity                    -- very nicely done, love the inclusion of the site 
                                map, really shows the repetition and ease of 
                                finding info on the site

The History of Science Society

This site is very simple and very well done. But it is a very basic site on the Society itself, so it's not a very complex site with a lot of different information. Simple. Elegant. Front page is update with information and news. I didn't scroll all the way down, and found that in comparison with the SHOT site, I like to see the WHOLE front page, so maybe a static page?

The Society for the History of Technology

Like the HOSS site, SHOT's site is very simple and very well done. Again, it's not a very complex site with a lot of different information. Simple. Elegant. Nice colors. Cool addition right on one of the tabs at the top is a "Resource" page. HOSS could use one of those.

Cultures of Knowledge

balance and rhythm -- a pattern emerges, index on the side, larger 
                                    scroll of the "reading" text, white space to
                                    edge of page (one one or both sides, Galileo
                                    had white space only on one side)             
                                   dominance -- colors nicely done, dominant 
                                   text shows highlighted readings
unity                        -- page to page stays the same, good unity

I'd like a site map, not exactly clear what information was where. Also a link to their super cool project should be on that front page! -- Early Modern Letters Online.

Ptak Science Books

balance                 -- nice balance, breaks model I mentioned 
                                 earlier
rhythm                 -- nice relationship to the white space and images
proportion            -- images that should be bigger are
dominance           -- not a whole lot of dominant text, so eyes don't 
                                really know where to go; colors are ok - not 
                                offensive, but could use, some background 
                                color to split off sections of information; this 
                                makes information hard to find and use right 
                                away, takes some time to swim through
unity                    -- nice repetition

Also pintrest? I can't keep up. I'll figure that out when it's been around for ten years.

From Cave Paintings to the Internet

There is nothing not awesome about this. Beautifully developed and SOOOOO easy to use.  Crazy good design. 



The Scientific Revolution HomePage

balance 
rhythm                -- the rhythm of this site is not perfect, sometimes
                               you'll be following along and a link will take 
                               you back to Hatch's home page, rather than the                     
                              Sci Rev homepage, requires more hunting about  
                             how to get back to where you were
proportion
dominance           -- Sometimes pages can be really busy, with 
                                colors and patterns, but it is OLD SCHOOL
unity                    -- what is identified as a link to a new page is not    
                                very uniform

I love this site, because I've been using it since 2001 or 2002, but that is in part because it has great basic (while still a wide berth) of information on what I studied. Dr. Hatch has continued to add new idea, information, and research, but it is definitely not the most up-to-date on information or design. This site is kind of a window into the history of the History of Science.

Chapter Four: Designing for the History Web

Rosenzweig and Cohen reference The Non-Designer’s Web Book by Robin Williams and John Tollett. The suggested FOUR elements of web design are:

1. contrast
2. proximity
3. alignment
4. repetition

These are also the same four suggested on the website MyInkBlog's article "4 Principle of Good Design for Websites."

Since I found overlap between two difference references, I am going to use AT LEAST these four elements when evaluating my HOS websites from this week as well.

Let's also look at an example from information designer Edward Tufte, included my Rosenzweig and Cohen because of its glowing approval from Tufte, its simplicity, and its presentation of historical knowledge.





"One of Tufte’s most celebrated examples of great design in historical texts is Charles Joseph Minard’s map showing the disastrous expedition by Napoleon’s army into Russia in 1812. As Tufte shows, the map (which he believes 'may well be the best statistical graphic ever drawn') accomplishes all that a well-designed historical work should." What does a well designed historical work need to accomplish? The graphic depicts a tremendous amount of knowledge, while also suggesting conclusions about that history. However it also has, "An unconventional yet unmistakable beauty arises from an elegant font, careful proportions, and judicious use of white space and contrast. Minard’s carte figurative is an ideal that one suspects can be emulated, although perhaps not matched, on the web."

I was immediately reminded on a favorite webcomic creator, Randall Munroe of xkcd. Rather than writing a brilliant comic, occasionally Munroe produces even more brilliant statistical graphics like this on movie narratives.






This is the one that I was thinking of, because of its similarity in style. But as I was rereading and looking at the statistical graphics I found one recently made on US History partisanship.

You should make sure to check out his other awesome creations on Online Communities 2007, Online Communities 2010, Lakes and Oceans, Gravity Wells, Height, and Money. They're all brilliant. AND I think couldn't be consumed or enjoyed with out the web. The format and style of these is so large, that one can zoom into read the text and look at the small bits, while also getting those larger conclusions that Tufte suggests as a key element in the well-designed historical work.

A Simple History of History Websites

This week I looked at a list of digital history, websites dedicated to historical topics, some of which were created in the early days of the interwebs.

The list in a some-what chronological order of creation; the links; and a brief commentary of each follow.

The Valley of the Shadow, 1993-207 -- 

A website investigates one Northern and one Southern community Civil War Era. It's a little difficult to find things on the site, and I'd also like to see digital images of the files like newspapers themselves. What I think is a neat idea is the little interactive "museum maps" taking the "visitor" to the archival sources.

Dickinson Electronic Archives, 1994 -- 

A cool collection of Emily Dickinson related primary sources. So it looks like they are revamping the site using a standard blog. This blog is a little awkward as the front page. I actually preferred the front page of the archived site.

Hawthorne in Salem, 2002 -- 

Made available in 2002. But this site looks even older than the Valley of the Shadow and the Dickinson Electronic Archive. That maybe be related to it's simplicity in nature. I didn't explore enough to see if there were primary sources here, or how well the information was cited.

Amiens Cathedral Project, ??? -- 

Interesting project trying to "walk" the visitor through the restoration (maybe a restoration?) of the Amiens Cathedral. This could be a cool way to present info/images, if you're not funded and if you have a lot of pictures of a particular place. This technology-wise is somewhere in the middle. Check out the Lascaux project for the modern, way awesome version of this being done.

Romantic Circles, 2007 (???) -- 

Primary sources relating to the Romantic Era. It seems  to me like they continue to add to the documents up there. But it is still a little work to find articles and what you are looking for. I love the idea of putting out online journals with articles available for free.

Persepolis: A Virtual reconstruction, (???) -- 

A step forward from the Amiens Cathedral Project. It was hard to find who is working on it or the dates created, making me skeptical. I like that this is for a city structure that no longer exists. I feel a little spoiled in this digital age--I want these virtual reconstructions to look like movies. That's probably not fair to ask poor, literally poor little historians. Consumers are not dumping hundreds of millions into these projects.

The Avalon Project, 2008 -- 

Site dedicated to primary sources in diplomacy and law throughout time. This site is really a vast collection of primary sources that looks, constantly updated and its simplicity is really its greatest strength. While it is a relatively new site, its appearance gives it the look of an older site, the difference is really in maneuverability and clean, easy interface.

Digital Karnak, 2008 --
This also looks VERY good. I love the time map. What a great idea. This is another one of those sites that allows the visitor to "walkthrough" a historical site that no longer exists. But it doesn't just do that, it aggregates other information on Karnak.

Jeff Gates creations:

In Our Path, 1983-2009 -- History of LA driving?

Life Outta Context, 2001-2010 -- The personal blog of same guy.

Eye Level, 2005-2012 -- Website of Smithsonian American Art Museum

Library of Congress-American Memory --
This is a hard one to find a date on it. But it is constantly updated, as one would hope and expect from the US Library of Congress. My suspicion is that it took quite sometime for the LOC to catch onto this digital age. Actually I think I prefer to use from the home page of the Library of Congress.

Hurricane Digital Memory Bank, 2005-2012 --
This may be an unpopular opinion, and don't mistake, I'm not making any sort of negative statement about Hurricane Katrina (or others) or the shootings at Virginia Tech. I don't know how if feel about these memory banks, like a lot of the "new media" it's soooo much stuff. I find these banks incredibly overwhelming. Maybe they are doing EXACTLY what they are setting out to do, but continuing to connect its users to the emotion of the historical events. How does a historian sort through it and use it? 

The April 16th Archive, 2011 --
An Omeka project, much like the Hurricane Digital Memory Bank.

Oyez Today, 2011 --
Audio recordings of the Supreme Court since the time that started recording in the Supreme Court. This is an interesting use of a different kind of primary source--a digital media dedicated to a digital medium.

Lascaux --
I don't know when this made, but it's got to be recent.  And it is BAD. ASS. It is a walkthrough of the Lascaux cave paintings in southern France. If you don't look at any other site you should DEFINITELY check this one out. It is beautiful and eerie. I tried to link to the english version, but you can get it in other languages. (Mom! You should especially look at this one! This almost makes Land of the Painted Caves palatable.)

BBC's History of the World Through 100 Objects --
Here's one of my own. I am really looking for cool sites related to European History, World Civilizations, History of Science. This is one that I've used before, and it's got a cool interactive timeline, that links you to interacting with the objects themselves. BBC also did a podcast series, each episode about 5 minutes talking about the objects.

How has the level of sophistication has changed on these digital websites? Rather obviously moving through a 3D space has improved dramatically as seen by the Lascaux project. Also the GUI (graphical user interface) has become more simple, user friendly. It's not just about simplicity, some of those early sites were simple, but the usability wasn't necessarily logical. Simple i think is key, but also easy to use, find, and search. 

Living the Past through Your Controller

Here's a couple of GREAT articles that I've found on history and video games.

http://www.notevenpast.org/discover/“you-have-died-dysentery”-history-according-video-games

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/gamesblog/2010/nov/19/assassin-s-creeed-brotherhood-history

Jeremiah McCall has recently put a book out on the uses of and kinds of games that can be used to present history, called Gaming the Past: Using Video Games to Teach Secondary History. He has lots of other great ideas, early research, and teach methodology on his website.

http://gamingthepast.net

The articles under "Theory and Practice" are great. In one article "Student-designed text-based simulation games for learning history: A practical approach to using Inform 7 in the history classroom," he discusses the use of a program Inform 7 to create AND have students create text based simulation games. In many of the article he focuses and stress that the interactive ability of video games, helps students to work critically with facts to "do" history. He writes,

History students, consequently, are taught most authentically and meaningfully when they learn to study history as a discipline rather than a subject. This entails moving far beyond the rote learning of teacher’s and textbook’s assertions about the past and developing several critical skills:
    * The ability to evaluate and analyze evidence about the past
   * The ability to combine pieces of evidence into a plausible interpretation of the past
   * The ability to discriminate between the critical and trivial parts of a historical event or process
   * The ability to use these skills to develop defensible, coherent, and meaningful interpretations of the past.
 Taught this way, students come to appreciate the discipline of history as a lens through which they can view the world. They learn to “do” history by forming their own justifiable conclusions about the past. In the process, students learn fundamental skills of analysis, interpretation, critique, and synthesis that will serve them well.

In Gaming the Past, McCall includes an appendix, listing different video games, their status, uses, time periods of historic simulation that can be used in a classroom setting. He also has some lesson plans for doing so outlined.  Many of this same information can be found on his website. (As a side note, I actually "checked out" the book for a month through Amazon Kindle App on the iPad. Here's me learning new things!)

In both articles "'You Have Died of Dysentery'-History According to Video Games" by Robert Whitaker and "Assassin's Creed and the Appropriation of History" by Keith Stuart, one of their major focuses is the incredible graphics and the players submersion into a stunning and rich historical environment.

The question is about the validity and value of that kind of history. Do "counterfactual" histories have a validity? 

I feel like I need to do some more research on how historians, view history through film and historical fiction. I have some general ideas about that, but not as much as I would like. I think that the lens through which to begin investigating history in video games, but I also think that there is something more at stake with the history through the video game.

The Changing Mentality of the Reader

Hunting for information and research on the difference between page reading and screen reading, was in and of itself an example of both the brilliant advantages of the internet as well as its labyrinthine experience.

Many of the studies that I easily found were for the early to mid 1990s, as people were just beginning to work off their computer monitors, and the internet was still somewhat a place that you could get to the end of. Twenty year later, with the advent of the tablet devices and e-readers the question is still a relevant one, but the focused has shifted from whether it’s a good idea to read on the screen to how this electronic reading is changing the way we think, and to what we comprehend.

The best article I found on the topic was an editorial piece from the New York Times. There were five contributors, all with incredibly difference backgrounds, education, current research, and each with a different focus on the issue of electronic reading. I want to highlight on a couple and then show the neural roads-less-traveled that I went on as the reader of this article.

Alan Liu, a professor of English and head of Transliteracies, a research group on the nature of online reading, information culture, and literature, focuses on the social aspect that reading online produces. While it can be considered “distracting,” he writes that

"Initially, any new information medium seems to degrade reading because it disturbs the balance between focal and peripheral attention. This was true as early as the invention of writing, which Plato complained hollowed out focal memory. Similarly, William Wordsworth’s sister complained that he wasted his mind in the newspapers of the day. It takes time and adaptation before a balance can be restored, not just in the “mentality” of the reader, as historians of the book like to say, but in the social systems that complete the reading environment."

I love this idea that Plato thought that writing was going to be bad for the study of philosophy, and that the invention of the newspaper was another doomsday device to the human's intellectual capacity. That's not to say that those inventions didn't change the way that humans interacted with one another, because that is SURELY the case. I find that I actually get my news similarly online, as how I got my news through a paper. I hadn't really thought explicitly about how the newspaper is an entirely different medium of information than a book, and that I get information from it differently (topical, scattered, thesis-sentence only, etc).

Davide Gelernter doesn’t focus on the social interaction that Web 2.0 can have on the book, but rather that a book can now be changed in a meaningful way to help the individual reader.

"I assume that technology will soon start moving in the natural direction: integrating chips into books, not vice versa. I might like to make a book beep when I can’t find it, search its text online, download updates and keep an eye on reviews and discussion. This would all be easily handled by electronics worked into the binding. Such upgraded books acquire some of the bad traits of computer text — but at least, if the circuitry breaks or the battery runs out, I’ve still got a book.

"Of course, onscreen text will change and improve. But the physical side of reading depends not on the bad aspects of computer screens but on the brilliance of the traditional book — sheets bound on end, the “codex” — which remains the most brilliant design of the last several thousand years."

I found a great article on the invention/creation of Gutenberg’s printing press, because I love to use the analogy of the printing press and the mass production of codices to the invention of the internet itself. Certainly, just because the printing press had been invented didn't mean that printers abandoned the earlier technology of writing, or the manuscript, but transformed those tools into something new. The dream that I share with Gelernter is that the book will continue to exist, but perhaps it will be a “Codex 2.0.”

As a child, I was obsessed with Penny’s, Inspector Gadget’s daughter, “computer book.” I often carried around the “H” or the “U” Encyclopedia Brittanica.  How do those two things relate, you might ask. Rightly so, the answer is not obvious. In the “H” encyclopedia, one could find the entry “Human Anatomy” and the “U” Encyclopedia include the entry on the “United States.” Clever book designers had used a handful of transparent sheets in each entry. For anatomy, there was a skeleton sheet, arteries and veins, organs, musculature, and a skin sheet. The “United States” transparencies included the land purchases and development of North America to the present size/state of the United States. I’m still not seeing the connection, you say. Oh right, still not apparent, is it? To an eight year old, these encyclopedias were Penny’s computer book. The transparencies allowed me to change and enter “data,” while my “screen” constantly updated to reflect my queries. It was the best!

Why don’t I have one of those yet?! That was 1988!! No, I’m not buying that my iPad is that thing. I want a tangible book. That I open up. And has pages. A durable, leather cover, lovingly created. Maybe if I tied to iPads together that would get me closer. I love books. I don’t know how many times I’ve said that I want to buy the book, but get a digital copy of the book at the same time. Put a code or a chip in the back! I don’t get why it’s not done.  That’s probably not fair. I know that there are authors who do offer that as an option.  Maybe the technology is on the way. This is a flexible phone/flexible display!  There’s still a chance for me to be Penny!