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Preservation Fragments #1
5 September 2014
Obsolescence and Our Relationship with the Material
The Things We Do #3 – Rebecca Chandler Enters The World of Collection Assessments
27 August 2014
For God’s Sake, Stop Digitizing Paper
25 August 2014
We are all aware of the expectation from the general public that EverythingEver is digitized and available online already. This is of course frustrating because, 1) when presented with the reality there is often a negative reaction from the public, primarily that archives are lazy and behind the times, but also, 2) the perception is often trotted out as a reason why preservation efforts are frivolous or don’t need to be funded, especially if the citation is in reference to commercial assets that are widely torrented. “There are a million copies online,” the argument goes, “Why should we care about archives or pay attention to their uptight rules?”, little aware that the bulk of cultural material in existence does not consist of Hollywood films, studio albums, and published works (or student websites from 15 years ago).
SAA AV Archives Night Wrap Up
19 August 2014
Thanks to everyone who made the First 1st Annual AV Archives Night party a success, both the archives who contributed content (program is available here ) and all of you who came out in support of the great work these archives do to preserve the audiovisual record. It was a spectacular collection of audio and video from DC area archives (you haven’t lived if you haven’t seen 1930s color Kodachrome). And, collectively, we totally blew the minds of the Black Cat crew, which is saying something.
What’s The Real Impact Of SHA-256?
5 August 2014
There are a variety of algorithms that can be used for generating checksums, with two in particular – MD5 and SHA-256 – being the most common. The comparative benefits and drawbacks of both are well-understood: while MD5 is weaker against random and deliberate collisions, it is faster to generate than SHA-256. However, there are no published empirical estimates for the difference in time-to-generate between MD5 and SHA-256 in archival and repository environments, leading to difficulty in making an informed decision as to which algorithm to implement for preservation monitoring.
This white paper documents a comparative checksum test of the same files under the same conditions, leading to some surprising findings about the actual processing speeds of the two algorithms.
AVPreserve Crew at SAA 2014
4 August 2014
AVPreserve consultants Josh Ranger, Bert Lyons, and Rebecca Chandler will be attending and participating in next week’s Society of American Archivists Annual Meeting in Washington, DC.
The Things We Do #2 – Interview with Consultant Kathryn Gronsbell
31 July 2014
The second in our “The Things We Do” series highlighting our great team at AVPreserve. In this edition, an interview with taxonomy pro and New Jersey native, Kathryn Gronsbell.
Making African Academic Resources Accessible
30 July 2014
Audiovisual preservation is a global concern. Yes, there is very much a local or personal flavor to it, with the widespread existence of regional archives, historical societies, institutional collections, and oral histories or homes movies well beyond large research repositories. However, when we look at the scale of the work to be done and the resources needed, we have to be equally concerned with efforts in other parts of the world. The fabric and depth of our own personal or cultural history is shallow and monotone without the reflection and input of other people, cultures, and nations.
Cloud Storage for Preservation Profile #6 Now Available
22 July 2014
Consultant Seth Anderson’s latest Cloud Storage for Preservation Vendor Profile is now available on our Papers & Presentations page. This profile takes a look at Preservica, a service that supports deep storage, production, and streaming or other web-based access of assets. In this way it stands out from many of the other vendors profiled in that its services extend beyond just storage to access. DuraCloud, our previous profile, also provides access capabilities, so it’s not really surprising that both services have a dedicated focus on supporting libraries and archives where preservation and access walk hand-in-hand. For some further comparison among the different profiles see Senior Consultant Joshua Ranger’s blog Comparing NDSA Levels Rankings Across Cloud Storage Vendors. And check out https://www.avpreserve.com/avpsresources/papers-and-presentations/#cloud for all of the profiles, as well as many more of our white papers.
AVPreserve at Digital Directions, DigPres14
21 July 2014
The AVPreserve team will be busy next week at bi-coastal digital preservation events. Consultant Rebecca Chandler is an invited speaker at the Northeast Document Conservation Center’s Digital Directions conference in Portland, Oregon. Digital Directions: Fundamentals of Creating and Managing Digital Collections is an annual training conference that presents 2 ½ days of instruction on basics and best practices for creating good digital objects, collections, and initiatives. Rebecca will be instructing attendees in two workshops — Digitizing Audio and Digitizing Video, which will provide a basic overview of identification, selection, and statement of work development when working with a digitization vendor.
