Digipubs

What is an e-publication?

My first reaction to this question was a few simple criteria:

1.      Any published material available in digital form, incl. books, articles, etc.

2.      Any published material designed to be optimised for digital access.

In particular, I thought of my lecture video's and slides, which are only accessible online, and academic articles which are "born digital", since I find them easier to read on a digital platform. Another definition comes from the online dictionary for library and information science.

“A work in digital form capable of being read or otherwise perceived, distributed to the general public electronically. The category includes electronic journals and e-prints, electronic magazines and newspapers, electronic books, Web sites, Weblogs, etc. Some electronic publications are online versions of print publications; others are born digital. Synonymous with e-publication.”

(Source: Reitz, J. M. Online dictionary for library and information science, 2004. Santa Barbara: Libraries unlimited.)

Both preceding definitions are broad, but still focused on the electronic form of content. Dr. Mercieca also delivered insight in the lecture to focus on the publication side, and the electronic delivery and distribution. In this, he raised the issues of propriety control of access – such as with Kindle or iBook files, and even YouTube video's – as well as the potential for e-publications to be completely different products compared to analogue/print publications, in terms of the interactive potential and the extra meta/data which can be stored and retrieved from them. Two other publication types for which I'd like to focus are images and games. 

One thing you might not know about me is that I'm fascinated by maps. In my downtime, I've taken real-world countries apart and put them back together differently, according to logical data points. One such is by climate zones, from a map by Australia's Bureau of Meteorology (BOM). This is no less than an e-publication by BOM itself; it may well exist in a physical form, but gains no additional functional worth by being distributed in a large hard-copy. 

Thinking of images as e-publications: A previous post had me wide-eyed about the possibility of virtual museum exhibits, and "interactive archaeology", in which the general public could interact with a 3D model of collected and curated artefacts, and gain insight into all the available details. I used the example of a medieval steel breastplate, which good gaming companies already create and use interactive 3D models. Indeed, the British Maritime Museum collaborated with the publisher Creative Assembly to let them reproduce historical ship models in Empire: Total War. 

This brings me to computer/video/mobile games, which are absolutely publications going by their industry structure. As an avid gamer, I notice and would love to see more collaborations between GLAMR institutions and game developers/publishers. They are a great way to sneakily have people experience things which are otherwise complex to explain. In my current favourite Kingdom Come: Deliverance, for example, you go from a penniless peasant to wealthy petty nobility; at some point, you notice that your priorities change in everything from diet to clothing to transport. Sid Meier's Civilisation: Colonisation is designed to simulate the settlement of North America by the West India Companies of European kingdoms; both games an internal reference function – the 'codex' and 'civilopedia', respectively – which then inspired further digital content.