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Re: [ARSCLIST] Digitizing libraries
This is a very interesting post, just one very quick comment. I have
been a consultant for the Library of Congress for about 5 years now -
and I can tell you for sure - absolutely - that those quotations of
space are just - well - silly. Since the library does not even have a
full accounting of exactly how large the collection is - and because
it grows every minute (literally) these "estimates" really have
absolutely no basis in fact. The Libraries collection includes many
more types of objects then books. And even if you just consider the
books - they are in many different languages - and what about the
pictures in the books? There are illuminated manuscripts. In the
National Audio Visual Conservation Center being built in Culpeper
Virginia, the estimate is that many terabytes a day will be generated
in the transfer of analog carriers. So - the planning is in petabytes
on an annual basis. As far as Ultra HD - that is an experimental
format that has been developed by NHK and is not a broadcast format,
and to the best of my knowledge is primarily a research and
development project. I would have loved to attend the lecture on the
St. Catherine digitization project - I am personally very interested
in that project. One comment about the operators used for
digitization - and this is from someone who has supervised many
people who have that precise job. There are many different types of
materials that similarly require different skill levels. One of the
overarching issues is not only the operator skill level, but the
standards set for a project and the quality control and system (by
system i mean ENTIRE system) used to maintain it. While humans are
great at certain things they are not great at everything - and as
just a matter of fact - often the task of digitization is a boring
job that is difficult to maintain concentration on. Sure, if all the
material was fascinating and we all had perfect days at work and at
home, and if humans could maintain a verifiable (meaning measurable)
level of focus that would be great. But - for example - for a human
to really be able to note material condition on a second by second
basis is just not possible. So after one has done this for a long
time - you get to the point where you look elsewhere to insure
quality control and consistency of work over time. Generally that
means systems that are either automated or semi-automated to assist
the operator.
I have not had time to comment on the threads on the Digital Black
Hole - but I have been saying for MANY years that the cost of storage
was only a small part of the full cost of maintaining a digital (or
anaog) archive. As time goes on, the proportion of cost of storage
relative to other costs will continue to shrink. This should not be a
big surprise to anyone really. It may be a paradigm shift, but it is
not all that different then what has been happening in the IT field
for many decades. One of the "good news" items in all this is that
because computers are so widely used there is tremendous purchasing
power that continues to drive prices down, and most expect that trend
to continue. Technology tends to get smaller, better, faster, and
cheaper over time. Society is making more AV "stuff" then ever
before, we need to continue the shift to an IT environment so that we
can manage it all.
Jim Lindner
Email: jim@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Media Matters LLC.
SAMMA Systems LLC.
450 West 31st Street 4th Floor
New York, N.Y. 10001
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Media Matters LLC. is a technical consultancy specializing in
archival audio and video material. We provide advice and analysis, to
media archives that apply the beneficial advances in technology to
collection management.
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SAMMA Systems provides tools and products that implement and optimize
the advances in modern technology with established media preservation
and access practices.
On Dec 13, 2006, at 9:56 AM, Karl Miller wrote:
"Steven C. Barr(x)" <stevenc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: >If this
implies what I suspect it may...it gets me thinking about
a further possibility! Since sound files for the most part start out
in digital form...and image files (as well as possibly text files,
such as books...!) can be converted to digital files by
>scanning...how long will it be before libraries are converted to
>institutions with huge multi-disc servers...Will future libraries
be >measured in terabytes (or whatever follows those...?!)...
There was a time when the content of all of the text in the Library
of Congress was used as a point of reference to give some
conceptualization of a terabyte...as I recall reading some years
ago...in an attempt to give some notion of the size of a terabyte
it was stated that if the entire text of all of the material in the
Library of Congress was converted to ASCII it woulc require about 4
or 5 terabytes of storage. Most recently wikipedia suggests it is
about 20 terabytes.
Also from wikipedia...one hour of uncompressed "ultra" high def
video takes approximately 11.5 terabytes. While it might not be
time for us to think in terms of zettabytes or yottabytes, we might
need to think in terms of petabytes.
As to the role of libraries in all of this. Many libraries
outsource their digital storage. It makes sense in that they don't
have the infrastructure to deal with it...level of salaries,
expertise, hardware, etc. Computer providers have all of the above,
so, they will be (and already are) our libraries.
Two nights ago I attended a lecture...there is a project to
digitize the approximately 4,500 volumes of the library of the
Monastery of St. Catherine at the base of Mount Sinai. They still
have lots of money to raise, but they estimate it will take 5
workstations about 5 years to do the job. Ok, we aren't talking
regular books, we are talking fragile material...perhaps not unlike
dealing with a glass based lacquer with some cracking...well, I
would guess the lacquer would be more problematic. So, it will take
time...my guess is that it will take them much longer than they
estimate.
In short, who is going to do all of this work? Who is going to
train the people? The presentor said they plan to use some of the
local bedouins to do the job...I am reminded of those who would use
work study students to do audio transfers...I am reminded of our
library director who places no value on the skill sets required to
do audio reformatting.
The folks working on the St. Catherine's project are having to
design their own scanning workstations...with an estimated cost of
about $150,000 a workstation...then the cost of salaries of those
doing the work...insurance, meetings, training, etc. Who has such a
large checkbook for something that might be of interest to Biblical
scholars around the world...how many biblical scholars are there?
What will be the final cost, per scholar, of scanning those 4,500
books?
My guess is that they will never finish the project. The
presentor also spoke enthusiastically about scanning two other
major libraries. Of course there is much to be said of the planned
imaging technology which will be applied to the these pages...the
reading of texts which had been written below the most readable
texts, those older texts having been washed off in order to reuse
the parchment being a major consideration.
I referred him to Jonas Palm's "Digital Black Hole."
While I am just thinking out loud...I wonder, by the time such
projects are done, what will be the state of the files of the first
pages scanned...will that data be error free...will we have changed
file formats...will our indexing modalities be the same...will our
imaging technology have evolved to provide us with even greater
clarity? Of course these are concerns which those of us in audio
preservation have considered from the first time we were able to
reformat.
For me, there are some fascinating questions. When is a library
not a library? My answer is, when the information is digitized.
When it is digitized it becomes magnetic storage in a computing
facility. Hence, libraries are now becoming coffee bars, cafes,
lounges, movie theaters, etc. Ah, now it all makes sense to me!
And, if you want a book, you go to Barnes and Noble or amazon.com
or abebooks.com or...
Karl