Re: [AV Media Matters] Long-term presentation: digital

[rburkel@juno.com]

To: Mike Csontos
Do 78-RPM records have an ANSI life expectancy rating?? If so, they may
be the audio equivalent of today's microfilm. Silver gelatin microfilm is
rated by ANSI at 500 years. The LDS church in Salt Lake City believe
their life testing verifies polyester based microfilm will last 1000
years. Of course the real benefit is minimal technology dependence.
Humans are the access device. History teaches us that methodologies with
minimal technology dependence are best for long-term access. As I
understand it, records are going into time capsules along with a playback
needle / earpiece and a pictorial description of a turntable. One article
I read, suggests using the metal master record instead of vinyl copies.

Russ Burkel
P.S. The Mormon Church has an ongoing effort to find a geologic storage
method. It is focused on media life. They will always store the vital
records of humanity in human readable form.

Since photographic film began using polyester as its base material, it
stands up quite well as an archival media. The Rochester Institute of
Permanence has given it a 1000 year life expectancy.

Finally, If you have a technology bias you cannot be effective as an
archivist. To paraphrase Dr. William Saffady, It is not the task of
archivists to prefer one technology over another, but to match the
preservation methodology to the application access requirement.

>I am a collector and preserver of 78-RPM records.  These ARE
>essentially
>stone slabs!  They are clay bound together with shellac, similar to
>the
>material that preserves dinosaur DNA.  The earliest records are very
>well
>preserved, in normal ambient conditions, for 100 years unless
>physically
>damaged. They contain samples of the culture of the end or the
>nineteenth
>century, so the above concept is not totally off-the-wall.
>
>Another medium with very long life is magnetic recording.  The
>changes in
>the
>earth's magnetic field are recorded in the ocean bed on a time scale
>of
>millions of years.  I have seen no degradation of wire recordings
>made 50
>years ago.  There are 100 year old Telegraphone recordings that are
>still
>playable.  The proper stainless steel in reasonable storage
>conditions
>should
>last thousands of years. Bit density may be lower than that of the
>finest
>particle coatings, but in the 1940s wire allowed six hours of
>continuous
>recording time on a reasonably sized spool.
>
>If someone is really interested in archives that will preserve
>current data
>on the scale of the clay tablets, perhaps applications of these
>materials
>could be looked into.  I just don't have much faith in organic
>chemistry's
>ability to create really stable materials.
>
>There is a precident for this.  From:
>
>http://vraptor.jpl.nasa.gov/voyager/record.html
>
>"The Voyager message is carried by a phonograph record-a 12-inch
>gold-plated
>copper disk containing sounds and images selected to portray the
>diversity
>of
>life and culture on Earth. The contents of the record were selected
>for NASA
>by a committee chaired by Carl Sagan of Cornell University. Dr.
>Sagan and
>his
>associates assembled 115 images and a variety of natural sounds,
>such as
>those made by surf, wind and thunder, birds, whales, and other
>animals."
>
>Mike Csontos