Learning about one of the largest digital projects ever created, Digital Darwin, and getting to speak with the man behind the creation of it, John Van Wyhe, was an interesting and valuable experience. Digital Darwin is itself a very impressive project due to the amount of time, dedication, patience, and passion one must have for pursuing a project of this magnitude. I still find it mind-blowing that it is the largest collection of documents and information dedicated to one single figure. Going into this, I did not know about too many historical digital projects, so being exposed to one of the most revered ones and speaking face-to-face with the mastermind behind it was beneficial to my understanding of these works.

During our chat with Van Wyhe, I learned that with great projects comes great responsibility and risk. He noted that Digital Darwin just might be the most under-cited scholarly website in existence. He has had to deal with many counts of plagiarism and stealing, and believes that some people simply take for granted the work he has done to assemble all of the historical documents concerning Charles Darwin into one place. That said, he is not exempt from his share of legal hardships on the other end. He stated that possibly the most difficult aspect of creating Digital Darwin has been getting permissions and rights in order. When dealing with so much documentation and so much history, there are bound to be cases where legal issues arise. I feel as though most projects like this–though not on this scale–would experience similar difficulties and complications when piecing the project together.

When I asked Van Wyhe if he knew whether or not the popularity of Digital Darwin spurred the creation of similar projects for other important historical figures, his answer intrigued me. He said that there were a few small projects created for a few other scientists, but that Digital Darwin is a special outlier since there is so much content and it has remained so crucial and debated throughout the last 150 years. The evolution discussion has produced so much material and inspired so much research that few other scientists’ findings could ever match the production of what Darwin has done.

Speaking of the evolution discussion, Van Wyhe acknowledged that the resource he has created has been used by both those who believe in evolution, as well as those seeking to debunk it. He knows that his collection of documents has helped fuel the fire in this heated intellectual debate. I admire him for addressing this by saying, “That is what its there for.” He created Digital Darwin for scholars, no matter their beliefs, to use for whatever purpose they wish, as long as they are not stealing or plagiarizing the material. This evolutionary debate is also a good thing for the site as well, giving it continued exposure for the foreseeable future.