During the past decade, the massive worldwide conversion of learning content from print and other older media on to digital networks has created gatekeepers who limit access to their digital content or require online users to pay for it.

A variety of gatekeepers have made a third choice:
to open their content freely into the Internet.
These are their stories.

November 28 , 2006

Folklore and Mythology Curator
University of Pittsburg Electronic Texts

Thor, the Viking Thunder God
University of Pittsburg

Thor is presented on a webpage that is part of the University of Pittsburg's Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts presided over by Professor D. L. Ashliman. He retired from the University in 2001 and continues his folklore research from southern Utah. The pages he oversees on Folklore and Mythology continue to be hosted by the University.

In 2006 Professor Ashliman's book on Fairy Lore was published about elves, dwarfs, gnomes, trolls, mermaids, brownies, pixies, leprechauns, and many other beings found in world folklore. A Barnes & Noble author note reads: "D. L. Ashliman, an emeritus professor at the University of Pittsburgh, taught folklore, mythology, German, and comparative literature at that institution for 33 years. He has also served as guest professor at the University of Augsburg in Germany."

Professor Ashliman's role as an online curator of the work that he has studied and taught through a distinguished academic career is a remarkable gift of the digital age. At the bottom of the webpage listing the works he oversees are these facts:

In October 1998 this site welcomed its 100,000th visitor.
In May 2001 this site welcomed its 500,000th visitor.
In April 2003 this site welcomed its 1,000,000th visitor.
In January 2005 this site welcomed its 1,500,000th visitor.
In August 2006 this site welcomed its 2,000,000th visitor.

The economics of the educational resources provided through Professor Ashilman's work are perhaps the most remarkable—likely to impress the canniest leprechaun. Although it would be impossible to measure the value of the professor's erudition and insight in the oversight he provides, in terms of dollars the budget would be no more than the salary of the one man, Professor Ashilman. He may not ask to be paid, and receives value in helping to sell his books from the acquaintance with him of visitors to the website. A value accrues as well to the University of Pittsburgh in attracting top students in the literary field.

There is no money measure to it, but the bottom line is it is a good thing to spread the lessons and enjoyment of tales like this one from Sweden preserved digitally in this website:

The Lad and the Fox

There was once upon a time a little lad, who was on his way to church, and when he came to a clearing in the forest he caught sight of a fox, who was lying on the top of a big stone fast asleep, so that the fox did not know the lad had seen him.

"If I kill that fox," said the lad, taking a heavy stone in his fist, "and sell the skin, I shall get money for it, and with that money I shall buy some rye, and that rye I shall sow in father's cornfield at home. When the people who are on their way to church pass by my field of rye they'll say, 'Oh, what splendid rye that lad has got!' Then I shall say to them, 'I say, keep away from my rye!' But they won't heed me. Then I shall shout to them, 'I say, keep away from my rye!' But still they won't take any notice of me. Then I shall scream with all my might, 'Keep away from my rye!' and then they'll listen to me."

But the lad screamed so loudly that the fox woke up and made off at once for the forest, so that the lad did not even get as much as a handful of his hair.

No, it's best always to take what you can reach, for of undone deeds you should never screech, as the saying goes.