When the term crowd-sourcing is mentioned, my initial thought is always to Kickstarter and other crowd-funding options. Then that got me thinking, does Kickstarter have a lot of history based projects looking for backing? And it really doesn't.
Searching through with the keyword 'History' I found a lot of historical fiction games, or retro-futuristic postings. But a few notables are:
One Fam : it's kind of like Facebook + Ancestry, chart out your family tree then share/post important memories and moments.
Forty Blocks: The East Garfield Park Oral History Project by Chicago History Museum : This project is to train students of the community to record oral histories of the residents. The students will work with film crews and museum staff to record the history of the predominantly black community which has undergone radical changes since WW2. Its a great way to not only get the residents' stories told, but to involve the younger community as well. It has completed funding earlier this year and I cannot wait to see how it pans out.
The Irish History Channel : A History Student from NUI is looking for funding to help establish a Youtube channel where he will document Ireland's history.
Hidden Histories of Million Wartime Women by Royal Voluntary Service : The Royal Voluntary Service is seeking to raise funds to research and document the wartime efforts of the Woman's Voluntary Services during WW2. About 1/10 of the entire female population of Great Britain (possibly the UK) serviced, yet there is very little published about them. With this funding they seek to tell the stories of the women via the thousands of artifact collected and make them available online for free. It seems the project has been making leaps and bounds after being funded. Their blog documenting more of their work can be found here.
Lorica Leggings : This kickstarter was to raise money to jumpstart a business which makes leggings with designs based off of historical pieces of armor. I have backed this one and I cannot wait for them to expand and offer more styles. Not quite history, but a way to bring pieces of history into our everyday lives.
As you see there is a range in nature, quality and funding requirements.
On the subject of transcribing projects, one recently showed up in my Facebook feed which seems to be very interesting. It is called Transcribing Faith and it focuses on books from the early modern period which document the of the 1470-1700 and is part of the Religious Change project which documents the changing nature of religion in that time period. It definitely looks interesting and I may try to contribute once this class is over.
And the main project has no change as the moment, as I am marathoning through all these blog posts. Though the first step when I return to it will be changing the search parameters to only newspapers in Virginia then further exploring story mapping and the timeline apps.
Thanks for the list of kickstarter projects.
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