I believe I mentioned during one of our classes the struggle that my colleagues and I waged against Apple in the 1990s when they tried to censor a history CD-ROM that we had developed and the company decided to bundle with all of its computers sold to schools. Details about the event are remembered in this link authored by Bob Stein, the head of the media company, Voyager, that published our “Who Built America?” CD-ROM. Bob wrote the blog in “honor of Tim Cook’s coming out,” noting the irony that one of the key reasons for the Right’s attack on the WBA? CD was that we talked about homosexuality. If Bob’s name sounds familiar he is the same person, now head of the Institute for the Future of the Book, that Kathleen Fitzpatrick mentioned last week in her presentation who helped develop the CommentPress software.
https://medium.com/@futureofthebook/in-honor-of-tim-cooks-coming-out-c4af0b652638
OMG – Steve,
This is SO IMPORTANT. Thanks for sharing. Thanks for the good fight. Thank YOU!
MJR
You are an advocate! This is inspiring to know that whatever our individual causes, there
is a light at the end of the struggle.
Wow! That is so cool. There’s also a lot of textbook censorship in Texas, but people usually get most angry about the censorship of science textbooks (leaving out evolution), or health textbooks (lack of proper sex ed.). However, remembering my own education, I am sure there were substantial portions of American history that were whitewashed as well. I feel like censorship of history textbooks probably goes on more than many people realize and people need to get angrier about it.
Steve, thank you for sharing this. These data projects I’ve been going through on our site really show that digital humanities work is so deeply involved with the current construction of historical narratives and perspectives–that this digital world cannot be divorced from our lived experience, including our struggles for social justice.