From the website:
The September 11 Digital Archive uses electronic media to collect, preserve, and present the history of September 11, 2001 and its aftermath. The Archive contains more than 150,000 digital items, a tally that includes more than 40,000 emails and other electronic communications, more than 40,000 first-hand stories, and more than 15,000 digital images.
This website is a perfect representation of my aims as a digital historian; that is not to say that the website has no flaws, but it represents a huge database of electronic resources. Most interesting are the 40,000 emails. This is an indispensable collection.
Emails are a great source of first hand accounts, they are personal and contain personal accounts of situations. Personal correspondence can't be faked, these are actual insight into people's thoughts and feelings. it offers a great step towards humanizing and connecting users with the personal aspect of the tragedy.
The September 11 Digital Archive is also nice because its collection is seemingly endless, this archive has been open since 2002 and now includes Emails from regular individuals, relatives and friends of victims, and government officials. The website also contains information like FDNY daily plans at the World Trade Center site. It has a catalog of interviews and a photo archive of information relating to 9/11 which is fully searchable.
Having been created in 2002, the website describes its self not only as an archive of resources related to 9/11, but also as an "opportunity to develop free software tools to help historians do a better job of collecting, preserving, and writing history in the new century." This website benefits largely from the limitless space available on the internet as well as the ease of accessibility afforded by the internet. It was so successful that the library of congress accepted the database into its own catalog. The September 11 Digital Archive is now guaranteed continued accessibility.
The biggest issue I find with this website, however, is also its greatest advantage. The website's "Browse" section contains 31 headings linking users to thousands of resources. This body of information, while very thorough, is intimidating in its scale. Navigation of the website could also be simplified, by more intuitive headings and a home page with some useful information the website could seem more welcoming. At its welcome page, the website looks almost empty.
No comments:
Post a Comment