tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-489467304915123985.post6437304500636134655..comments2011-08-02T11:21:30.258+01:00Comments on View From The Lair: J D Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09361127656762444440noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-489467304915123985.post-55984694057125391732011-07-06T19:27:52.452+01:002011-07-06T19:27:52.452+01:00Tristram Hunt really should know better. Yes, ther...Tristram Hunt really should know better. Yes, there is nothing quite like handling a document that is decades. or even centuries, old, and even the best scanning technology won't reproduce every aspect of the original - the texture, the weight, or the smell. One of the reasons for digitization is to make sought-after records more accessible, but it is equally important to protect the documents from excessive handling. <br /><br />There is certainly more to a document that the words it contains, and if it were not for experts on historical ink and paper the infamous Hitler Diaries would never have been exposed as fakes. But for the vast majority of researchers the availability of good quality images that can be downloaded anywhere in the world is a godsend, and provides the information they need. <br /><br />There is a potential downside to digitization, which is more to do with the indexing that often goes with it; when you can parachute in directly to the page that you want you miss all the incidental details that you see when you have to trawl through a large book. So there is a danger of losing the context, but this is down to the behaviour of the researcher than the nature of the source. Perhaps Dr Hunt would do better to employing his (presumably considerable) skills and knowledge to help the newly-empowered research community appreciate the strengths and weaknesses of online research. As it stands, his comments make it sound as though he just doesn't like sharing his toys.Audrey Collinshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17109060807297085410noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-489467304915123985.post-72815656978492752452011-07-03T23:37:06.388+01:002011-07-03T23:37:06.388+01:00Thank you for bringing this article to my attentio...Thank you for bringing this article to my attention – not being a reader of that newspaper. <br />I would agree that nothing could compare with actually handling original documents – that experience of ordering a document at TNA and not knowing what will turn up at the desk. Will it be an enormous box of rolled up documents or a small piece of parchment a few inches square – and how does something that small manage to survive several hundred years? I am not a “proper” historian and probably Mr Hunt would shudder at someone like me being able to access original documents, but this is our heritage – it belongs to us all and we should be able to look at it, if we want to.<br />BUT - I am a family historian. At one time we could visit a church and search parish registers, then they were filmed and we could order a microfilm and search – if we knew what parish to look at. Now images and indexes are available online for many areas of the country. How would the original books survive if everyone wanted to look at the originals?<br />So the original documents should be there for those who can make the effort to visit, but those researchers who are too far away or not able to visit, should be able to search and see images of the documents.<br />Finally, you mention the State Papers Online. Someone like me, an amateur, cannot look at this site without visiting TNA, which defeats the object of the exercise. Why is it not available to all?Christine Hancocknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-489467304915123985.post-57095578079160627482011-07-03T18:22:39.507+01:002011-07-03T18:22:39.507+01:00I'm right with you David. Speaking as a Canadi...I'm right with you David. Speaking as a Canadian who is going to the UK to do his PhD (quite happily, mind you) if digitized documents had been available earlier I may have been accepted at other universities. <br /><br />Given the expense of living in the UK and the real possibility that I may have to move back to Canada midway through my program, I'm going to spending a lot of time with a camera, digitizing the many documents I run across. One near future project I will be doing is the creation of a wiki which will have all of the photos uploaded, so I will be able to access my research from anywhere in the world.Sam McLeanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00828718309612547799noreply@blogger.com