EDITOR'S NOTE
What’s Past Is Prologue
by Brandi Scardilli
On DC’s Legends of Tomorrow, various B-list superheroes (don’t tell them I said that—they prefer to be called Legends, thank you very much) travel through time to stop temporal aberrations from changing history as they know it. When a time pirate crash-lands in the 1860s and starts spreading a zombie virus or someone accidentally prompts George Lucas to drop out of film school, the Legends are there to get the Civil War and the creation of Indiana Jones back on track.
Similar to the Legends’ vow to keep the historical record unharmed, the Humanities Commons aims to preserve the scholarly works of its users. In “Oh, the Humanities! Creating Community With the Humanities Commons,” Marydee Ojala looks at this new repository and what it means for researchers who can now share ideas and collaborate on the platform.
Corilee Christou’s article, “Preserving OERs for the Future,” shows what happens when organizations interpret a Creative Commons license differently. The case of Great Minds v. FedEx Office and Print Services, Inc. is putting the future of open educational resources (OERs) in jeopardy. If only the Legends were as adept at amicus briefs as they are at hand-to-hand combat.
John Charlton’s International Report often covers archives that preserve priceless historical objects, and this month is no exception. Work has started to save a German abbey’s previously concealed archive of art objects dating from the Middle Ages. The local government is on board with digitizing the archive, and it plans to make it available online by the end of the year.
Happy reading!  |
