Again, the importance of context

This makes it harder than simply being conscious about what we do, why we do it, how we do it. If we begin with a distant reading based on these papers, how can we possibly know what shifts will take place in order to focus on the right words/thoughts over time? Perhaps going into this process before knowing what we are looking for is useful. We might note significant usages/ shifts of words or topics over time and then have an idea that we should be looking for them more deeply.

Just as we discussed previously, the use of "outside" context and close reading in addition to this digital work is essential for good scholarship.

As a personal note, I appreciate seeing Linux included because all too often it is forgotten or ridiculed by others.

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Perhaps this wouldn't be a big problem for the analysis of newspapers, but for other things, it would most certainly matter.

Fair point. It's an interesting technology, but perhaps we had better get a firm understanding of it before we jump right in.

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Simply put - but this really is the essence of what we are doing. Besides, this style of writing is intriguing and certainly a change of pace.

traditional essays are sort of the opposite. They start with specific information and research and move out to broader arguments. interesting how they connect and compliment each other.

Not sure exactly how this would look, but including these discussions in our papers seems important after all the previous readings we have done.

Lots of digital history seems to be like this ... start something, switch focus, go back to it and try again with a different tool or lens.

Security, and as we learned in XLMing My Way to Data Management, keeping clean and organised filing systems.

I can see this being very useful in large workplaces where the changes and documents created by one employee become almost impossible to find or understand after they leave. I recently experienced this when trying to make simple modifications to some quantitative data analysis. The previous person had saved the end files, but not their methods and calculations, so I had to guess and invent my own methods.

This only works if they are universally recognised as having done this. Otherwise, they are just one more group putting out materials that are not well taken up.

Wow, now I'm imagining thousands of university students blindly typing in words they think will get them useful information and consistently missing or misusing sources.

Hmm, I hadn't really given much thought to critically including within my essays a section on how I located and decided to use journal articles.

I wonder if this is a positive or negative? Working with large amounts of data, I can see where easy results would be useful. However, with our society's obsession on immediate gratification, perhaps it would be good to have to work a little harder for important research findings.

I'm getting stuck at this step. It responds with "throw err; SyntaxError:/home/claremaier/search.json: Unexpected token {

My high school teachers always said not to use Wikipedia for research - but to use it to broadly understand a topic before arming yourself with key words and ideas for in-depth research.

Put this way, its loss is truly horrific. However, as historians, I think the ever-present caution about ethics is important too. It would be fascinating information (for anthropologists as well), but should we really access it?

At first, I wondered if the author was being melodramatic, but I see his point and hadn't thought about the types of situations he presents. Like him though, I don't have any solutions. I'd like to say people wouldn't do those things, but "we are only human".

I'm not sure I quite understand what DRM and TPM are. Perhaps someone could summarise or suggest a helpful video? Thanks

I find this is often the case - even in daily life. In trying to set some colleagues up for a task this week, I wrote out what I thought were clear instructions. Soon found out that there were numerous details which I understood, but were not set out and were causing confusion and extra work to sort out. Useful, but unnecessary eye-opener.

Excellent point. While we champion digital history and public history as a way to make minorities visible, we have to still be aware of who is doing the work, coding the search formulas and such. I recall a conversation about the importance of including women programmers on projects to address online bullying and harassment because they bring a different perspective and work on the problem from a different angle.

Is this extra revenue passed on or is it pure profit for the journal publisher? Could we argue that online journals also cost money because they are considered valuable and Western culture typically associates value with high costs?

I'd be interested in knowing more about the work that goes into a journal production. I don't think we students appreciate this enough.

Interesting question I had not considered before. If data is aggregated poorly or presented poorly, is the researcher at fault (for example, faulty medical studies leading to harmful reactions to medicines?)

It's kind of sad when it is put this way. Perhaps this is part of why there is such an emphasis (through annotations and slack) of working together in this class.

I think in light of our discussions on open research, this point is valid. Just because we put ourselves out there for criticism and discussion doesn't mean that contrary opinions are wrong. Of course, sometimes it does.

This is something I encounter when I submit assignments for class. I don't have the Microsoft Office suite, I use LibreOffice (formally Open Office - Linux) and while the two programs are similar, they are not the same. I constantly need to consider formatting and how I save my files because while LibreOffice can open and use .docs, Microsoft will not open .odt. Frustrating.

This seems like a good idea, but the implications on census statistics and such seems dangerous somehow.

Interesting... Not sure if he is attempting sarcasm or not, but it would seem that he would be interested in sharing his current thoughts on his new book. That way he would be not only writing about archives and such, but participating in their creation and active research collaboration.

When everything is boiled down, I do think this is likely the final underlying objection. Perhaps it is human nature and just as children grab back their favourite toy, we will always need to resist the urge to announce "that's my research".

Of course it is a good idea not to waste time, money, and effort collecting the same piece of data, but can't anything be said for the process of handling old documents or of taking in the fragile paper, faded text, or other contextual aspects? After all, people do still enjoy reading a paperback.

As an anthropologist undergrad, the recognition that North American scholars unintentionally bias/focus on North American themes/literature/culture and see it as normative is important. It would be an adjustment in data analysis, especially when using different types of alphabets and we would have to develop different ways of analysing/ conceptualising/ interpreting connections between ideas and phenomena, but it is an exciting prospect.

Yes, historians need to continue playing a part in the conversation. However, I caution against excluding those who can best contextualise what we want to save - the bankers, farmers, trade ministers,stay-at-home mothers, and others. It really must be cross-disciplinary and collaborative.

I guess the counter-argument (not that I always agree) would be the issue of funding and the idea of "standing against" governments in some form. Could be problematic.

This is good to remember about sources - they are useful, so if it is useful, we can use it in some way to inform us.

Hadn't thought of them like that before. Generally just saw them as free and a slight protest against big companies such as Microsoft.

Interesting perspective. I often think about the ethics of companies storing and using digital information often unintentionally provided by users, but not about how historians should use it.

Key here is thoughtful and careful - just like in all work.

Good, concise definition

I like this explanation and it helps me to see how it is useful to understand history broadly as well as digging deeper into in order to understand smaller, more complex parts.

I find this interesting - in order to see the large (macroscope), it is necessary to winnow down complexities. Perhaps it is fair to compare it loosely to zooming into a picture because to see the full picture, it is necessary to skim over all the little details.

I'm sure this will come in handy in the future.