Chapter three of the required read discussing digital humanities focused in on the impact of sharing knowledge beyond academia. The book mentions how before digital humanities, one author researched and created their own paper with the purpose of giving their work to an academic institution where other professors and students could read it. Only small groups have access to the papers uploaded through academic institutions because the majority of people lack the required paid subscription or login information.
When answering the question of what will happen when knowledge credentialing is no longer controlled solely by institutions of higher learning, my response would be openness. If educational resources were no longer locked in the depths of academia for only a few scholars interested, the general public could freely view any work published. This change would impact the amount of knowledge available for any user of the internet to view, hopefully leading to a better more well-informed human population.
This openness of new information could also lead to more collaboration. In general, if papers and sources were available to anyone with internet access, more people could respond to works with their own research. This could be in the form of a new paper publish or a digital humanities project. To me, digital humanities offer the general public a chance to learn new information, taken from papers and scholarly reports that they would have otherwise struggled to read. When a digital humanist creates a website with interactive tools, splitting up complicated information into separate pages with deep analysis, the general public can read and dissect the information quickly without feeling lost. My personal goal in addition to making my website open to the public is ensuring that the way I present information can be understood by virtually any high school student or older.
With the help of digital humanities, the public can offer feedback through comments, interacting directly with other users on the specific site of interest. This open communication gives everyone the chance to engage in a larger discussion. The book states how with a paper or book published in academia, the work is finished in terms of how the one author feels about his or her finished product. With digital humanities, the website and work of research is never finished because a diverse community of users can continue to add to the final product.
