NY Times Article About Preserving Digital Images

[David Karp]

Not posted for digital bashing, and not really new news for most here probably. Just interesting in that it is in a mainstream publication.


http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/10/technology/10archive.html?ei=5094&en=0b6f57f06554be78&hp=&ex=1100149200&adxnnl=1&partner=homepage&adxnnlx=1100106626-RV2c6BGUTY4CjbYcEGzEtg (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/10/technology/10archive.html?ei=5094&en=0b6f57f06554be78&hp=&ex=1100149200&adxnnl=1&partner=homepage&adxnnlx=1100106626-RV2c6BGUTY4CjbYcEGzEtg)

[Thomas Nutter]

Will this news reach the uninformed masses in the consumer market? They are the ones who determine the viability of products like film. Photo hobbyists and professionals? We already know. If I'm shooting anything important...It surely goes on film.

--Tom Nutter

[Tom Westbrook]

Short of a clear solution, experts recommend that people copy their materials, which were once on vinyl, film and paper, to CD's and other backup formats.


It's a more than bit mistifying why these "experts" are recommending conversion of hardcopy archives to CDROMs when the whoe story is about how dangerous that could be for long-term viability! Sounds like people should actually be doing the reverse.

It will be very interesting to read what the LOC comes up with, though.

[tim atherton]

Tom,

You mean the same folks who used to buy that Seattle Film Works stuff because it was cheap? Or who kept their colour negs from their wedding 20 years ago in the attic where they are now toasted (or in the basement, where spidery little bits of mould have eaten into those nice, bright Kodachromes)? Or who throw out the negs when they get film back from the Supermarket lab with their 4x6 enprints, because they don't think they'll ever need them again.

The same photographer who keeps his/her negatives and transparencies in archival sleeves and tries their best to keep them in the best environment they can to preserve them is probably the same photographer who will store their image files of Gold/Phthalocyanine CD's and/or the now cheap offline massive hard drives and has a regular workflow which migrates the files every few years (like any decent archive is doing now and has been doing with sound and video recordings for 30 or more years - and in many cases, until the work can be migrated they do indeed keep the old equipment around to play it. It's what archives do). Of course, if their house burns down they don't lose all their originals because they were able to keep separate copies off-site... :-)

Most damage done to photographs and other documents in archives isn't done by poor storage over along period of time but rather by fire, flood, earthquake and theft.

It's something of a new world, but there are many fairly easy and straighforward solutions to these problems (and having helped set up records management workflows for governement departments in comjunction with archives, in some ways, managing the digital records is much easier and simpler than managing the paper records)

[Ralph Barker]

I feel blessed to have dozens of family snaps dating back to the turn of the last century - all original prints, and mostly in excellent condition, notwithstanding unknown storage conditions in the interim.

I also have dozens of CDs full of digitized and original digital images. I'm not looking forward to the day that I need to transfer all that data to a new format that will survive for another decade or two.


http://www.rbarkerphoto.com/misc/Family/Shadrack+EllaBarker1916-600.jpg

great grandpa and great grandma Shadrack and Ella - circa 1915



<small>ain't nothin' like the real thing ;-) </small>

[Tom Westbrook]

True, Tim, there are a wide variety of storage issues. One concern is not so much with the media, but that the data formats themselves become unusable. Will the use of the Rock Ridge extensions when burning a CD of TIFFs render the data useless at some point? Will Jolliet be supported forever? Who gets to re-burn all those CD's or transfer to better media when the very data order threatens to become obsolete? Of course, it would be something that could be planned for by large entities, but I don't think it's the large entities that will need the help. What's Granny going to do? She's keeping some pretty interesting stuff, and are her heirs going to find any ancestors on those old hard drives, floppies and CDs? Or just toss them because the contents are if not unreadable, are invisible?

Emails are an interesting thing (maybe a bit OT, though). Everyone uses a variety of programs to read emails and they aren't necessarily easy to move between various programs. How will correspondence be preserved if the emails are stored in any number of proprietary formats?

I think the point is that a hardcopy photos need no other "work". They are useable as is, bits on magnetic or optical media are not useable as is. I wonder, too about EMP effects is this age of terrorism. Those hard drives will be toast, though I expect the CDs would survive. On the other hand, digital is far easier to duplicate and send off-site than hard copy is.


Most damage done to photographs and other documents in archives isn't done by poor storage over along period of time but rather by fire, flood, earthquake and theft.

I've always wondered whether those fire safes people use survive very long when buried in hot coals for a few days after one's house burns down and collapses on top of it. Doesn't seem likely.

It's a very interesting subject and I would like to know more about what's being done/planned.

http://www.tomwestbrook.com/albums/Family/palms.jpgMother's side of the family [Brought to you digitally from Granny's shoebox].

[Thomas Nutter]

Tim--

Good point. What good are those cloudy plastic strips anyway, they never match the pictures in the bottom of my sock drawer. Those shiny round things you get from kodak these days really do make better coasters anyway. It's about time they gave you a useful free gift with those Big Prints.

[Andre Noble]

"As long as you keep your data files somewhat readable you'll be
able to go to the equivalent of Kinko's where they'll have every ancient computer
available"

[Steven Buczkowski]

"As long as you keep your data files somewhat readable you'll be able to go to the equivalent of Kinko's where they'll have every ancient computer available"

I nearly fell off my chair when I read this line. I re-read it a couple of times thinking the person being quoted was being facetious. I've come to think he was actually serious.

That's a level of optimism that requires medication.

Even if Kinko's, or somesuch, has every ancient computer available, will they have access to all software, in their many versions available? They might get a good portion, but it'll never be as easy as that quote suggests. Proprietary data formats are a b*tch, espescially once the software company has gone belly-up.

Steven

[Jeff Moore]

The biggest question I have is, If it is printed in the New York Times, just how much of it can one believe?

I just couldn't resist. :-)

[Alois Lazecky]

Hi ! CDs have some advantages especialy when your basement gets flooded. I'm using MAM-A Gold cds which are guaranteed to last a life time www.mam-a.com it looks like pretty serious product.