Christopher,
I think the gist of your message was that all technology becomes obsolete,
and all of our new and cool stuff will do so in time. We have no choice but
to do the best we can now, while looking to the future, or we will lose the
opportunities we have now.
We have been talking and researching for years to determine the "archival"
nature of new media. The need to migrate them to newer media as they come
about is a given, and should be incorporated into any policy on the
creation and management of digital archives.
The problem is that the new media have been developing faster than we can
determine their longevity. DVDs came out about the time we figured out that
CDs actually do deteriorate over time. After about 10 years or so, they
will start to lose small bits of data, which will eventually destroy the
integrity of the information on the disk. The same thing that happens to
VHS tapes, but at a much slower rate. DVDs are the same technology as CDs.
CDs and DVDs are NOT to be considered permanently stable. No matter what
the reps tell you, they are not going to last forever, whether you store
the in the right conditions in a polyethylene sleeve or not. Plan on
testing and recopying these media at regular intervals to prevent data
loss. I have no specific information on "gold CDs" etc, but I would not
count on them being much more stable than any other. The color comes from
the coating on the upper surface of the disk, and has no effect on the
stability of the data stored on the disk itself.
None of this should have any effect on the ability of any institution to
collect and preserve oral histories, or whatever form of data the chose. We
just have to think a little farther ahead.
Mark Janzen
Registrar/Collections Manager
Edwin A. Ulrich Museum of Art
Martin H. Bush Outdoor Sculpture Collection
Wichita State University
(316)978-5850
"Christopher J.
Dawson"
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You say you don’t want to use “obsolete technology,” but be careful ...
Some of the “new” digital technology is flashy and cool (especially when
you’re trying to get donors to cough up money to help your institution to
pay for it), but the material made on that new technology is often not good
for long-term archival storage. You have to think of that long-term
storage need, and the need to make the material accessible. Yes, you can
record oral histories digitally, on a DAT or even on a recordable CD, and
that’s a good stable medium ... But then you put them away in the archives,
and in decades someone wants to pull out that oral history ... And no one
has a CD player to listen to the disk!
That’s sort of a worst-case scenario, and it can be overcome, but it
requires a commitment down the road to move the “data” (the interview) from
the media it is on, to whatever becomes the new “standard.”
Same for video histories ... You can do some nice work with a digital
camcorder, but make sure soon after you’re done that you make VHS copies,
so that the interviews are accessible to researchers cheaply. You might
also want to copy the interviews onto DVD, but again, make sure in years to
come that if a new media form comes out that becomes a “standard” like
DVD/CD is now, that you convert the interviews to that new format.
Oral histories are like fine wine ... They become better and more valued
with age. But they can become worthless if not stored properly.
--
Christopher J. Dawson
Curator of Urban and Industrial History
Western Reserve Historical Society
10825 East Boulevard
Cleveland, Ohio 44106
216-721-5722 x247
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"History is a guide to navigation in perilous times. History is who we are
and why we are the way we are." -- David McCullough
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