I will be giving a talk, entitled “Paths to PAD: Saving the Legacy of Early Electronic Literature,” to scholars involved in the Electronic Textual Cultures Lab (ETCL) at the University of Victoria on January 22, 2015. The presentation argues that while digital preservation has centered on emulation and migration, the Pathfinders project has made it clear that the 3rd and least popular method of preservation––collection––though challenging to undertake, provides essential information about a work that may be lost. Ultimately, the work Stuart and I have done with the traversals of five different works of e-lit has led us to encourage preservationists of early digital literature to pursue all three methods. I will be looking specifically at Judy Malloy’s Uncle Roger in this presentation in order to underpin my argument.
I thank Dr. Ray Siemens for this invitation and for the opportunity to visit the ETCL. While I am there, I will be able to observe the work the lab is doing with Wikipedia, something I am very interested in.
