Re: [AV Media Matters] Digitizing Audio and Video-ReallyBigPost

[sallen@gwm.sc.edu]

>Moderators Comment:
>I am not sure what exactly is meant by "promoting the heck out of it"
so
>I will ignore the comment although I do find it somewhat offensive. 
<snip>
>As far as tiny archives that do not have the financial resources - I
>suggested what has been suggested for many years by many people.
>Regional archives and depositories where an economy of scale can be
>maintained. 

Speaking of finding something "offensive".  8^)  I do not believe that
the problem of cost is restricted to "tiny" archives.  And I am not sure
that waiting for even larger, monolithic, monopolistic "archives" is
much of a final solution, either.

It has been suggested that libraries and archives don't have the
financial wherewithal to take care of media, so why don't they get out
of the business, and let Business take care of it?  With all due
respect, a LOT of media that is being cared for in the archival world
was generated by very large businesses who had no interest in taking
care of said media any longer (or, in the first place).

Therefore, it wound up in the hands of (admittedly) poorly-funded
archives who do the best they can to preserve this material and make it
available to as many people as they reasonably can, now and for as long
as possible.  I, for one, find it offensive myself, that we get knocked
- - essentially - - for trying to do a big job with a little money, that
the Big Boys won't do with a lot of money.  Even if they do get into the
archiving business, it will frequently be at the cost of access, or
"reasonably-priced" access.

Those of us in the world of university-based archives have to reach
some sort of balance, where we do have to charge something for
access-at-a-distance, but far less than some might.

I realize that this list serves a lot of industry people who have
access to (what would seem to me like) a lot of money.  Where "economy
of scale" readily applies.  At this archive, there is even one specific
instance where the number of our videotapes falls within a proscribed
number for economy of scale - - and we still would not be able to afford
the price break.  So much for tiny.

It would be nice if we could have a little more respect.  But I guess
sometimes, you have to buy that, too 8^).

With no offense intended, but also a great sense of weariness,
Scott Allen
University of South Carolina Newsfilm Archive
sallen@gwm.sc.edu 
www.sc.edu/newsfilm/ 

Moderators Comment:
I think that this will be my last comment for a while - - - 
Many people have suggested regional depositories for all sorts of
reasons in this field. I believe I first heard it relative to cold
storage, and I believe it was also suggested in the Library of Congress
report. I do not believe that Regional also means Monolithic or
Monopolistic, and I don't think that regional has anything to do with
business, certainly not big business. Economy of scale has to do with
the concept of depreciating (or spreading) the cost of a large
infrastructure over many items. It has nothing whatsoever to do with the
size of an archive - it is an economic term. It relates to the concept
that to build 1 car may cost hundreds of millions of dollars due to the
cost of building the assembly line, R&D, etc. So it could be said that
the first car cost millions, and the second only the cost of the raw
materials. The concept of economy of scale suggest that to be able to
justify the large costs of infrastructure a certain number of items must
be able to take advantage of the infrastructure - otherwise it is not
cost effective. For example it could cost $50,000 to build a cold vault
to store 1 tape - or 10,000, the cost more or less is the same - so by
joining forces smaller archives can reach an economy of scale due to the
combined resources possible. That is the concept.

I believe that the issue originally posed was that the cost of archival
storage in a file based AV world is costly, and that smaller archives
(that includes Tiny) may not be able to afford the cost, at least on
their own. I suggested that there are several ways to accomplish the
goals, some of which involve outside contracting and have also suggested
that for some archives waiting is a better policy (to a point) because
of the historically decreasing cost of storage. Storing large quantities
of Audio now at preservation levels of quality is relatively affordable
- certainly more so then it was 10 years ago when virtually the
identical concerns were raised. When blank CD media cost $50 it was an
issue - when it costs $.50 it isn't.

Running an AV archive on any scale has never been "cheap". In most cases
the materials themselves were produced at great cost. My concern is that
so called "passive" management where the content stays on the shelf on
the same carrier for n number of years does NOT work with electronic
media. We HAVE learned that, and even if we still haven't - it should be
very clear that manufacturers will not support a format if there are no
sales, so expecting support for an obsolete format is not a good long
terms strategy in my opinion. So if we do know what does not work -
maybe we should try to come up with some new ideas. Some of those may
not work either - and some will work for some situations and not for
others. 

I have taken it even further then that, because it is not only the cost
of hardware that is required, that is what you come to with some casual
thinking - if you think about it a while there are much large
implications and issues - and frankly major challenges for AV archivists
from a vocational point of view. At the Boston AMIA conference last year
I brought up many issues relating to what is really required in a file
oriented world - which CLEARLY is where we are headed - like it or not.
It is not just a pile of disk drives, but an entirely different set of
skills then the AV Archivist has had in the past. I also suggested that
there are other people who have greater expertise in some of these areas
and that we can learn from them. I do not see any harm in that
suggestion.

As far as "buying" respect, well frankly that is a cheap shot with no
basis in fact.I guess all I can say is that I have tremendous respect
for small archives. I personally have contributed my personal time,
expertise, and yes money too - to small archives. I personally have
established 3 different endowments in different organizations in this
field to specifically support and encourage developments in technology,
many of which hopefully will help all archives - large and small. I also
served on the Board of Directors and Chairman of the Board of one for
many years - an archive that has had very very little financial support
- so I "get it". As they say I personally have put my money where my
mouth is too - and as you will soon see one of the results of that
effort (and the effort of many others as well including AMIA, The
Library of Congress and Sony Pictures) will be preservation grants being
available from the NTVPF (National Television and Video Preservation
Foundation) - an organization specifically founded to help orphan video
work. That bit of business has taken many years of effort and support
through some VERY tough times.... but I don't want to steal the
foundations thunder - you will hear more soon enough. I have helped
literally hundreds of archivists and I cannot think of a SINGLE time
when I have refused helping anyone in this field - with or without money
when I could. 

So - with all due respect, keep up the good work. Keep the stuff alive
long enough so that it can be migrated - because if you think that
people will be able to play back BetaSP tapes 200 years from now - you
are wrong, so we better come up with some solutions - and fast for large
AND small AND tiny archives. Do you have any helpful suggestions??

Jim Lindner

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