A few weeks ago I was at an art exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario, in Toronto. One of the items on display was one of Leonardo Da Vinci’s original notebooks. it was under glass of course, but I was still able to get a close-up look at the notebook, and it was an incredible experience; I felt as if I was reaching across centuries to sense (however dimly), the mind of a genius, and a treasure of our world’s cultural inheritance.
I also got the sense that, if properly cared for, this priceless artifact could be preserved forever, so future generations could look at it in wonder, learn from it, and hopefully for some, be inspired to make their own contributions to our cultural birthright.
In contrast, I think of so much of the cultural output of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and how impermanent it is. Much of the physically published work has been printed on cheap, acid-filled pulp paper, and is rotting away before out eyes. It certainly won’t survive for five centuries like the works of Da Vinci.
Much has also been written about the impermanence of electronic and digital media. While I would not of course put the following example in the same category as Da Vinci’s work, one of my projects right now is the digitization of three VHS cassettes I have from 1989 to 1991. These tapes are recordings of three amateur Gilbert and Sullivan Operetta productions in which I was fortunate to participate. VHS tapes are not know for their archival permanence, and even after only 18 years, I am seeing degradation of the tapes. Even once I have digitized these tapes, I am not out of the woods. There are varying opinions as to how long home-burned DVD’s can last, and of course if industry supported formats change at some point down the road, and players are no longer available, I will be effectively cut off from this content.
Of course, back-ups on hard drives are not safe. I was recently in touch with a friend who may have lost years of her digital photographs, due to hard drive problems. (We are still hopeful that a hard drive recovery program like Spinrite may come in and save the day). Even if there had been multiple back-ups on CD’s, there have been many instances of CD-ROMS degrading and becoming unreadable as the years pass.
In contrast, I think of the colour slides my father took decades ago. They have been properly stored, and are still bright and vibrant after 40 or 50 years. Back in the early 1980’s I did some colour darkroom work using a process from Ilford called Cibachrome, and those prints are just as vibrant today as they were when I first made them. I don’t see most colour inkjet prints lasting even a fraction of that time without significant fading.
It is ironic that while we have never been surrounded by more information and content, it has never been more malleable or ephemeral. The term, “Carved in Stone” just doesn’t apply any more. We are in a vast sea of information, and while the sea itself endures, each piece of information is like a wave, ever changing, and impermanent.
At the same that issues with digital storage threaten the long term survival of cultural assets, current copyright restrictions have placed a lot of material into legal limbo. If a work is still in copyright, but the current copyright owners cannot be contacted for permission to use/reproduce the work, it cannot be copied or distributed. As far as a wider audience is concerned, it might as well be lost. A lot of work from the twentieth century is in this unfortunate limbo.
I wonder if this is exactly the scenario desired by the entertainment industry, and those who would see themselves as cultural gatekeepers. Is “old” culture (particularly public domain/free culture) seen as the competition to the book, movie, or recording of the moment? If so, the more old content can be made unavailable to the average consumer, the more new content the average consumer would be willing to buy. Is culture now to be sold the same way as clothing, where (if fashion retailers had their way) you are expected to throw out your culture and buy replacements every year, just to remain fashionable?
As more and more content is sold in what I would call fragile forms (e.g. downloaded media), or forms whose post-purchase use and access can be significantly controlled by the content seller (DRM, encryption etc.), I fear we are headed to culture with a definite shelf-life, and “Best Before” tags controlled by the vendor. The term “culture consumer” takes on a whole new meaning, if we are tricked into believing that culture is something that is consumed, or used up like a jug of milk, and therefore needs to be purchased over and over again.
Tags: Culture, DRM, DVD,Media, Photography
loan advice business commercial small80 down loan no 20loan 10 10 80 homeloan day 30 pay100 start up loan businessup business 100 start loanmortgage 2nd loans 2nd mortgagelink address mortgage loanloans 2nd changemortgage home loans 2nd
chat adult sex networksex 3d modelsteen amateur fantasies fuck3d porn comicssoft amateur pornamiture teen girls picsdvds adult pornaccessories for teens Map
personal 2500 loanacs services loansloan $300,000amortize payments loanagriculture loans africanloan home 80 20$150,000 loan homecash advance loan line Map
first loan financial serviceswisconson first home loans ownerbank svcs loan first marketbuyers home time loans first homesmall first loan business timeloan rate college fixedloan equity home flloan florida co-op Map
fuck fingerpussy gapingass gaylick assbreast bondagefingering pussyjapanese pussyfine ass Map
Share on Facebook
Tweet This Post