Re: [ARSCLIST] Pancake horror story

[Malcolm Davidson <malcolm_davidson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Tom,

"Names deleted because this was told to me in confidence. Suffice to say,
these tapes are valuable
and not replaceable."

This is the statement that caught my attention!  Surely anyone making such a
decision to send originals needs educating, and rather quickly. I doubt
there is anyone on this list who would willingly send original content
anywhere by shipping company.  It shows that, in this case, the company had
scant regard for the inherent value of the original analog tapes.  (If they
must send them go with a courier)

Unfortunately it's the same mind set that many people often have when it
comes to file back up.  A hard disk crash wipes out files that were never
backed up, now what?  In the above case, at least we hope there were digital
copies of the files.

Malcolm Davidson


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tom Fine" <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, January 17, 2008 6:37 PM
Subject: [ARSCLIST] Pancake horror story


> Some people swear by the practice of storing reels of tape as un-flanged
"pancakes" on a hub. There
> are some well-documented benefits to this practice, from cost-saving to
possibly avoiding damage if
> the box is dropped and flange is mangled badly enough to damage the
tape-pack. Well, let me tell you
> a tale ...
>
> Names deleted because this was told to me in confidence. Suffice to say,
these tapes are valuable
> and not replaceable.
>
> Tapes were archived on hubs, mistakenly shipped overseas and mangled on
the way back in transit.
> Badly mangled. It will be lucky if there are not unrepairable problems in
parts of tape containing
> music. This would not have happened if the tapes were on reels, although
the mangling was bad enough
> that the reels may have been bent. The owners of the tapes correctly blame
the shipping company but
> I would argue that it's a lesson in just how brutal shippers can be,
especially if a communications
> problem of lower-level employees gets something sent overseas and back.
>
> My take-away was that if one is to ship tapes as boxed-pancakes, one needs
to take extreme measures
> to keep the tape-pack rigid and protected. I would even suggest rigging
something up using a metal
> film can. Certainly don't use decades-old cardboard boxes, even if they
are grouped in large box and
> surrounded by rigid packing material.
>
> -- Tom Fine
>
>