Mediating and connecting: versatile digital publishing in the Edison Papers

In the chapter titled “Mediating and Connecting: Versatile Digital Publishing in the Edison Papers,” we discuss a framework for reconfiguring the Thomas A. Edison Papers as an integrated digital edition of primary sources. In the digital edition, stratified levels of sources enhance the accessibility of complex historical collections in digital environments. The concept of providing multiple layers of access was already implicit in the Edison Papers online book and image editions. Our reader-centered approach enables an interactive experience displaying primary sources both from text- and image-based collections documenting the work of Edison 

The resulting reading experience occurs in International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) interfaces that can deliver images and texts from multiple servers on the Web. IIIF-compliant images present materials to readers in a coherent way, allowing deep zoom, comparison, page layout, and annotation through a IIIF image viewer, Mirador Viewer. The digital edition is customized, based on readers’ queries, and the interconnected design can potentially promote collaborative reading, scholarship, and applications in pedagogy, resulting in a versatile investigation of technological advancements and industrialization in Edison’s lifetime.