Re: [ARSCLIST] Hard disk drives and DAT

["Richard L. Hess" <arclists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 01:14 PM 2007-03-28, Jeffrey Kane wrote:
> 6 of one, half-dozen of the other. Institutions
> (universities/foundations/etc) aren't constrained by the need to turn a
> profit on the service. Yet, they're subject to budget vagaries and in that
> way are potentially even more at risk than a commercial vendor. In any
> institution; what happens if the budget is gutted and not enough funding
> exists to properly maintain a storage facility?

Valid point, Jeff!

The three repositories that I have worked with for placing content 
are: Library-Archives Canada (Marie-Lynn Hammond's original tapes), 
Stanford University (the Mullin-Palmer collection originally from Jim 
Wheeler), and the University of Toronto (for the project I'm working on now).

None of these organizations are immune from funding shortfalls. 
However, the depth and quality of these three institutions have 
impressed me. (Disclaimer, I have recently undertaken some consulting 
work for Library Archives Canada so that is no longer an arms-length 
relationship, but it was when I placed the Marie-Lynn Hammond material there).

All three of these archives (and in the case of LAC and Stanford, 
they are holding physical artifacts as well as files) have selection 
criteria of some sort and just do not "take everything". In fact, 
Marie-Lynn received a tax receipt for her donation of her material to 
LAC, but we had to submit a proposal and have it approved before 
sending the material in.

I was not impressed with the storage/care at a state university, but 
even there, one individual rose to the occasion and migrated 7-8000 
analog tapes to CD-R using a staff of volunteers. The major cost was 
the cost of the blank CDs.

So, I would like to understand how an organization in the commercial 
sector can compare to LAC, LoC, Stanford, or U of T. Another 
potential digital repository project that I'm discussing involves the 
use of the Notre Dame digital repository. Another large organization 
that I trust to be around for a few years.

I do agree -- and I've been saying this in my presentations for years 
-- digital archives do not respond well to funding interruptions. On 
the other hand, physical archives don't either. Imagine turning off 
the HVAC completely...we saw what running an economizer cycle 
overnight did at the state university archives. What happens if a new 
roof cannot be funded?

Cheers,

Richard


Richard L. Hess                   email: richard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Aurora, Ontario, Canada       (905) 713 6733     1-877-TAPE-FIX
Detailed contact information: http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm
Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.