The training layer: a meta-aggregator / Electronic Literature Collection
Electronic Literature Collection
https://collection.eliterature.org/
historical lineageField history and indexes of electronic, generative and computational literatureWriting addressed to a receiving apparatusactive
The archive's reading. The archive reads the ELC as the canonizing anthology of the procedural lineage #186 names (electronic literature, where the machine is method), whose value to this census sits at the level of works: Volume 3 holds a record of The Readers Project, software readers that compose from what they read. The saved home page lists volumes only and says nothing of a machine reader or of training, so the selection of relevant works waits on traversal of the volumes.
| Relation to this census | historical lineage |
|---|---|
| Record type | anthology |
| The question it answers | field history: which works of electronic literature did the ELO select into its four curated volumes, and when? |
| Kind | a publication of the Electronic Literature Organization: curated, edited volumes of electronic literature, published on the Web and as a physical version |
| Operator | the Electronic Literature Organization (ELO), c/o Washington State University Vancouver as the collection's mailing address; Wikipedia (third party) states the ELO is currently hosted at York University, Toronto |
| Evidence | anthology |
| Unit of record | a volume of the collection (four so far), each holding works of electronic literature |
| What it records | works of electronic literature curated and edited by the ELO in four volumes, October 2006 to June 2022; Wikipedia (third party) states that ELC4 holds authors writing in some thirty languages, Mezangelle among them |
| In the layer | not recorded: the saved home page publishes the volumes on the Web and says nothing of crawling or training |
| Under whose name | not recorded on the saved home page, which lists volumes only; Wikipedia (third party) names works in the volumes with their authors (Judd Morrissey's The Jew's Daughter, Michael Joyce's Twelve Blue) |
| Found and read back | not recorded: the saved home page links the four volumes and offers USB copies of volumes 1 and 2 by mail; no search or catalogue is shown |
| What the apparatus makes from it | not recorded |
| Method | curated, edited volumes published by the ELO; Wikipedia (third party) quotes Tim Wright on gathering, archiving and tagging the works for Volume 2 |
| Coverage | geography: international; ELC4 authors write in Afrikaans, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, isiXhosa, Yoruba and other languages (Wikipedia, third party); period: volumes published October 2006, February 2011, February 2016 and June 2022 |
| Count | value: 4 volumes; as_of: 2026-11-01 (home page read) |
| Holdings | Volume 1 (October 2006); Volume 2 (February 2011); Volume 3 (February 2016); Volume 4 (June 2022); free USB copies of volumes 1 and 2 by mail for libraries, educators and individuals |
| Stated limits | 'The physical publication of the ELC3 is forthcoming.'; Tim Wright (quoted by Wikipedia, third party): gathering, archiving and tagging the works 'also freezes (necessarily) what may have been otherwise ephemeral or in situ' |
| Data access | free on the Web; USB copies of volumes 1 and 2 by mail on request |
| Licence | not stated in the saved sources |
| Lifecycle | state: active; detail: four volumes, 2006 to 2022; the home page states the physical ELC3 is still forthcoming; no fifth volume is announced on the saved page |
| Version and time | volume_1: 2006-10; volume_2: 2011-02; volume_3: 2016-02; volume_4: 2022-06; read: 2026-11-01 |
| Founded | 2006 (Volume 1); the ELO itself 1999 (Wikipedia, third party) |
What its record can settle
- whether a work was selected for one of the four ELC volumes, and in which volume and year
- when each volume was published
What it cannot settle
- whether any ELC work is in a training corpus or a model
- the full contents of each volume (the saved home page lists none; Wikipedia names a few)
- how works were selected (the saved sources state no editorial procedure)
Kept apart
- NOT the Electronic Literature Directory, the ELO's separate database of works
- NOT the ELO itself: the collection is one of its publications
- NOT a corpus or dataset for training: the sources describe curated volumes for readers
- NOT writing for the machine reader by its own statement: the sources name no machine addressee
Relations
- neighbour: CELL Project: Consortium on Electronic Literature (Wikipedia (third party) lists Davin Heckman as the ELO's Managing Director of CELL)
- neighbour: ELMCIP Electronic Literature Knowledge Base (the ELMCIP Knowledge Base holds records for Electronic Literature Collection volumes One, Two and Three among its critical writing)
- neighbour: electronic book review (electronic book review lists the Electronic Literature Organization among its support and affiliations)
- has_part: readers-project (Volume 3 holds a work record of The Readers Project (saved as readers-project--elc3); the record describes the project and is not a separate project)
Evidence
- self_description (the resource's own statement):
Electronic Literature Collection A Publication of the Electronic Literature Organization
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - volume_1 (the resource's own statement):
Volume 1 (October 2006)
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - volume_2 (the resource's own statement):
Volume 2 (February 2011)
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - volume_3 (the resource's own statement):
Volume 3 (February 2016)
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - volume_4 (the resource's own statement):
Volume 4 (June 2022)
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - web_and_physical (the resource's own statement):
Electronic Literature Collection is published on the Web and as a physical version. The physical publication of the ELC3 is forthcoming.
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - usb (the resource's own statement):
Libraries, educators, and individuals may request a free copy of the volume 1 and 2 USB by mail:
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - operator_address (the resource's own statement):
c/o Washington State University Vancouver
https://collection.eliterature.org/ · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 7f2a4e3496731e48… - elo (a third-party account):
established in 1999 to promote and facilitate the writing, publishing, and reading of electronic literature
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - elo_host (a third-party account):
The ELO is currently hosted at York University , Toronto, Canada, under the leadership of Caitlin Fisher
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - four_volumes (a third-party account):
The ELO has curated and edited four volumes of electronic literature.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - names_vol1 (a third-party account):
Most notable among these would be Judd Morrissey ’s The Jew’s Daughter , Michael Joyce ’s Twelve Blue
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - limit_freeze (a third-party account):
the process of gathering, archiving and tagging the works to make them more easily available to a wider audience, also freezes (necessarily) what may have been otherwise ephemeral or in situ.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - elc4_languages (a third-party account):
ELC4 presents the largest and most diverse group yet of elit authors writing in Afrikaans
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - mezangelle (a third-party account):
Korean, Mezangelle , Norwegian
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - directory (a third-party account):
The Electronic Literature Directory [ 19 ] is a database of works of electronic literature.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - cell_director (a third-party account):
Managing Director of CELL Davin Heckman
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Literature_Organization · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 f94079547b89e37f… - elc3_readers_project (the resource's own statement):
Electronic Literature Collection, Volume 3
https://collection.eliterature.org/3/work.html?work=the-readers-project · read 2026-11-01 · http 200 · sha256 a0e466d1a6bf6cd3…
Unchecked
the four volumes' own pages and their tables of contents (not saved); the ELO's own site eliterature.org (not saved); the ELO's history and hosting are known here only from Wikipedia (third party), which places it at York University while the collection page gives a Washington State University Vancouver address; the licence of the collection and its works; the works of each volume beyond The Readers Project's ELC3 record, whose saved page carries Flash preservation notes by the Electronic Literature Lab without stating which work each concerns
Cite: Lee Sharks, ed. "Electronic Literature Collection." The training layer: a meta-aggregator, traininglayerliterature.org, compiled 2026-11-01. https://www.traininglayerliterature.org/aggregators/elc