Trust and Digital Preservation

Trust and Digital Preservation, 4th – 5th June — Day 1 By Alexander Kouker

Today I went along to the first installment of a two-day workshop revolving around the idea of the importance of creating trust and authenticity within the domain of archival and preservation practices around digital content information. What follows below is a selective recapture of today’s activities and some relevant resources.

The day started off with an introduction to APARSEN, which is an alliance of institutions in the business of enabling long-term accessibility and usability to digital information and data through a shared and sustainable infrastructure. Consider in particular their knowledge base, which contains resources on technologies and preservation tools. David Giaretta’s half-hour lecture on the difficulties of digital preservation is well worth checking out in this context.

Source: Libfocus

Learn to preserve digital memories

Learn to preserve digital memories  

The Library of Congress has created a new document that should be copied by anyone wishing to know how to preserve digital photos for future generations. Instead of using cameras and film, photos are now being taken with phones, tablets, and digital cameras. Being able to preserve such images requires a whole new set of guidelines. As stated in the booklet’s introduction, “One of the still unfolding impacts of the computer age is that everyone now must be their own digital archivist. Without some focused attention, any personal collection is at high risk of loss — and quick loss at that.”

Source: The Commercial-News

Presentations from ‘Getting Started in Digital Preservation’ workshops

Presentations from ‘Getting Started in Digital Preservation’ workshops 

Presentations from the popular DPC / BLPAC ‘Getting Started in Digital Preservation’ workshop in Aberystwyth in June are now available online. To see these, as well as the presentations from similar events in Glasgow in April and London in May see: http://www.dpconline.org/events/details/56-getting-started-in-digital-preservation?xref=61%3Aeventtitle  

The roadshow has been popular and each of the stops has sold out well ahead of time.  Discussions are now under way about extending the programme in September.  Details will follow.

Source: Digital Preservation Coalition

Film vs. Digital Preservation

Film vs. Digital Preservation: 1st Best Picture Oscar Winner, Kubrick’s Oscar nominee 

Wings, Dr. Strangelove: Film preservation and ‘Amazing Tales from the Archives’ (photo: Charles ‘Buddy’ Rogers, Clara Bow, Richard Arlen in William A. Wellman’s Wings) The 2012 San Francisco Silent Film Festival’s edition of “Amazing Tales from the Archives” was perhaps the weakest of the series to date. In the past, they have done a wonderful job demonstrating the excitement of finding lost films and footage, assembling them together, preserving and restoring them. This installment revolved around the “Digital Age,” and did not concentrate only on silent film. The reconstruction of William A. Wellman’s Wings (1927), the first Best Picture (or “Best Production”) Academy Award winner, was a familiar story of how an old film print could be dusted off and used for the production of a Digital Cinema Package. By now, we all are aware of the importance of film preservation, which is part detective work and part modern technology.

Source: IMDb

Preserve Our Technological History: A Proposal

Preserve Our Technological History: A Proposal 

I propose a broad movement to collect and preserve the books and other physical materials that document the creation and development of 20th century technology.

By David Hill

As IT professionals, we naturally think of information as being digital. But vast quantities of technological data exist in books, papers, notes and other physical formats. These data, created by researchers, scientists and inventors, are the primary sources that document the creation and evolution of technology in the 20th century. If we lose these sources of information, we lose a piece of our technological heritage. I propose a broad effort to preserve these materials.

At a recent dinner, I sat next to a retired physicist from Raytheon whose work focused on the development and application of microwave technology. Microwave use goes far beyond household ovens, including radar and the creation of industrial diamonds. The scientist had taken it upon himself to preserve an entire room’s worth of books and written documents that describe the history of microwave technology. He was concerned about what would happen to this material after his death. While his daughter kindly offered to preserve the material, it’s not a long-term solution.

That shocked me into thinking about all the technology developed in the 20th century. What’s happening to the documentation that describes the evolution of scientific and technological developments across innumerable fields? Pockets of materials are probably being preserved in various industries and university research facilities, but as far as I know, there is no concerted effort to store a broad base of technology documentation.

Source: Network Computing

Europeana Releases First Free iPad App

Europeana Releases First Free iPad App 

We are delighted to announce that we have launched Europeana’s first free iPad app. ‘Europeana Open Culture’ introduces you to hand-picked and beautiful collections from some of Europe’s top institutions, and allows people to explore, share and comment on them.

Designed by Glimworm IT during a Europeana hackathon, the app provides an easy introduction to Europe’s glorious art treasury through five specially curated themes: Maps and Plans, Treasures of Art, Treasures of the Past, Treasures of Nature and Images of the Past.

Source: Europeana

Broadcasters warm to cloud-based video processing

Broadcasters warm to cloud-based video processing, says Jeff Malkin

Last week, Encoding.com, a San Francisco-based video processing service, announced Scripps Network Interactive had selected its cloud video processing service to make possible distribution of television shows and other video content from HGTV, Food Network and other channels via the Amazon Instant Video on-demand video platform.

In the cloud video services space, the deal is another sign that broadcasters are overcoming their initial concerns about the safety of cloud-based solutions — specifically that their valuable video programming content is secure and not prone to theft.

In this podcast interview, Encoding.com president Jeff Malkin discusses broadcasters’ growing acceptance of the cloud, the challenge of encoding content for multiple, changing playback platforms, the prospects for MPEG-DASH to make things easier and dealing with new FCC rules mandating closed captions for broadcast content streamed via the Internet.

Source: Broadcast Engineering