Digital History is an introduction to the issues involved in creating an educational history website. Roy Rosenzweig and Daniel Cohen the authors and, respectively founder and director of research projects at the Center for History and New Media (CHNM) are the obvious people to write this guide. After showing just how new the New Media, the internet, is they show several examples of what can be done on the web. From national projects like the Library of Congress’s American Memory project to personal ones such as Jim Zwick’s Anti-Imperialism website and multi-national projects like the International Dunhaung Project we see the range of possibilities and learn that regardless of our resources we can create an interesting and popular site.

Once the range of possibilities on the internet has been established the book moves on to practical matters. Design, software, hardware, to hire or do-it-yourself are all discussed as is how to attract traffic to your site and how to gather data for sites like the September 11 Digital Archive and the United Kingdom’s Moving Here. The short history of copyright in the chapter Owning History is worth searching out on its own merits. The legal considerations involved in putting photographs, music and documents on the web are covered from an educator’s viewpoint with a warning that commercial sites will be held to different standards.

This is one of the finest practical histographies I have read and, from what I can see it is one of the most up to date. With a topic as fast changing as the internet that is no small accomplishment. The book seemed like a quick read. I say, “seemed”, because I have never seen the physical book and have no idea how long it really is. The entire book is available on line at CHNM, which is where I read it. The electronic version of the book is laid out in a way that struck me as ingenious. Every word of it is accessible on one page from inside a window. Each chapter is broken into sections and it all is accessible with little need to scroll down the page. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in doing web-based history. ( )