For the first time, the Smithsonian Institution has granted access to 2.8 million high-resolution images from “all 19 Smithsonian museums, nine research centers, libraries, archives and the National Zoo,” for use by the general public. They’ve done so through a new open access platform that allows users to download anything they’d like free of charge. This is just the beginning, as “the institution continues to digitize …
Reflecting on Toni Morrison’s Life, From Her Point of View The first African-American woman to win the Nobel Prize, a Pulitzer prize winner for penning Beloved and a mentor to millions, among many other things, Toni Morrison lived unapologetically but with unmatched empathy, intelligence and insightfulness. She famously told Terry Gross (of NPR’s Fresh Air) that she “regret[s] everything” about her life. She explained in …
Thanks to a project funded by the New York Public Library (and spearheaded by two of its employees), millions of books published before 1964 will soon be free to download and read. Historically, books published before 1964 were subject to a 28-year copyright term and after those years passed, the books would (likely, aside from exception) become public domain if the publisher or author did …
