THIS CHAPTER EXAMINES the development of a pioneering digital humanities project called the Internet Medieval Sourcebook (IMS) by outlining the original goals of the Sourcebook, noting the factors that shaped its subsequent expansion, addressing the challenges that the project's digital format posed, and drawing on usage data to analyze how the Sourcebook's audience interacts with the site. The IMS originally consisted of two major parts. The first was made up of short classroom-sized extracts, derived from public domain sources or copy-permitted translations, while the second was composed of the full documents, or links to the full documents elsewhere on the web. It rapidly evolved, however, to become part of a much broader Internet History Sourcebooks Project (IHSP) that guided users to sources through a series of focused indexes.

The choice to present a wide range of medieval primary sources on a digital platform offered significant advantages over the traditional print reader of sources assigned in most medieval history courses. The audience for IMS, for example, widened to include students, teachers, and the general public. Because the Internet Medieval Sourcebook can curate and provide thousands of translated primary sources from the Middle Ages, it also offers teachers and students far more choices since the digital medium does not have the limits on length imposed by print publications. Indeed, the flexibility of the digital format has facilitated the addition of sources beyond those dealing with western European political and institutional history that predominate in print readers—not only more texts on Byzantium and Islam, but also ones focusing upon gender, sexuality, and the non-elite. Finally, the digital format provides four other major benefits. First, the translated primary sources are available free of charge, which considerably reduces costs for students. Second, the varied subject categories and digital navigation afford users multiple paths to enter and explore the available sources.