sIMPly archivists

Oh Snap! The Rise of Digital Cameras

Through my lifetime I feel like I’ve encountered so many transformative pieces of technology that it’s difficult to narrow it down and choose just one thing. Something that has had a big impact for me personally has been the digital camera. Digital cameras (not our current definition of ‘digital’) have existed since the 1970s, but my Fujifilm Finepix S3300 point and shoot is the one that springs to mind for me personally. Growing up, my family had used film cameras to capture our lives and we had photo albums full of prints from our developed films, as well as the negatives. My digital bridge camera was definitely a game changer for how I viewed the process of taking photos and opened up new possibilities.

I’d seen the images produced on film through my childhood; a bit grainy sometimes but usually ok. Blurry images when someone had moved, or those pesky blinks that seemingly ruined a photo. Knowing you’d need to wait until the next time you could drop off your film for developments (not always as soon as you’d like when you live in rural Yorkshire). Before my bridge camera I’d also been fortunate enough to own a flip camera phone so I’d had the ability to take photos digitally. You could take low-quality photos to your heart’s content until your limited phone memory told you that you couldn’t take any more. This bridge camera changed everything and actually kickstarted my love of photography.

Image of the Fujifilm Finepix S3300 camera, with a face-on view into the lens. The camera is all black and is central in the photo on a white background. Photo taken by myself (Ash Charlton).

For me, the things that set it aside seem very commonplace now. You could take as many photos as you liked – having a memory card with the option to take hundreds of photos compared to the limited number of shots on a roll of film, or even the limited memory space of my mobile phone was amazing. You could also review the photos (in reasonably good quality) as soon as you’d taken them – easy to spot if someone had blinked or moved out of place. I could easily download them from the memory card and edit instantly, print them as soon as I wanted, or store the digital files easily. I found that it changed the way that I viewed the world and I’d always be looking for something to take photos of.

Image of a variety of brightly coloured 35mm film rolls scattered on a white background. Photo credit: Marcus Winkler, sourced from Unsplash.

Photographic equipment is naturally disposed for technological obsolescence as technology advances. Film cameras can be classed as technologically obsolete; as digital cameras (whether compacts, bridge, DSLR or even just phone cameras) became more accessible and the technology developed, sales of film cameras and rolls of film declined. This underpinned the decision of some companies to stop producing film such as Kodak’s popular Kodachrome, prompting a race to develop the rolls before it became impossible.

Digital cameras have superseded film cameras but film has certainly been making a comeback in popularity in recent years. After speaking to some friends that shoot on film I did actually buy myself a 35mm camera during lockdown and I’ve absolutely loved using it the last few months, it’s a real nostalgia trip. My trusty little bridge camera was ideal for a few years until I decided to upgrade for a more technical DSLR; it still functions but I can get a lot more technical scope and higher quality images with my upgrade. That’s the thing with technology; something bigger and better always comes along.

Unfortunately due to an unstable laptop and failure on my part to safely backup my files, I lost a lot of the photos I’d taken on this camera but I still have a couple stored on an external hard drive. They’re not technically brilliant photos but they’re valuable to me as personal records so I’ll be preserving them for myself. I still have the camera too as I couldn’t bear to let it go when I upgraded mine. It’s probably not worth preserving in itself but I can’t bear to let it go just yet so it sits in its case in my box of camera equipment.

If you want to learn more about the history of cameras, the resurgence of film photography in recent years and a bit more on the famous Kodachrome, check out some of the articles below.

Further Reading

Cerini, Marianna, Why Kodachrome was the Instagram of its time (2020) <https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/mid-century-memories-kodachrome/index.html> [accessed 27 October 2020].

Del, Jennifer, Has the Smartphone Made Digital Cameras Obsolete? (2018) <https://www.eeworldonline.com/has-the-smartphone-made-digital-cameras-obsolete/> [accessed 27 October 2020].

Ilford Photo, ILFORD PHOTO GLOBAL FILM USERS SURVEY, THE RESULTS ARE IN (2019) <https://www.ilfordphoto.com/ilford-photo-global-film-users-survey-the-results-are-in/> [accessed 27 October 2020].

Laurent, Olivier, This Is Why Film Photography Is Making a Comeback (2017) <https://time.com/4649188/film-photography-industry-comeback/> [accessed 27 October 2020].

Madison, James, Whether You Like It or Not, Film Is Having a Resurgence (2020) <https://fstoppers.com/film/whether-you-it-or-not-film-having-resurgence-445069> [accessed 27 October 2020].

Trenholm, Richard, Photos: The history of the digital camera (2007) <https://www.cnet.com/news/photos-the-history-of-the-digital-camera/> [accessed 27 October 2020].

The Garmin Forerunner 235: Ready, Set, Record!

Stretch? Check. Playlist? Check. Hit start on watch? Check. The mental list before setting off on a daily run is complete. Now just to pound the pavements until you reach that glorious 5k mark.

When I purchased the Garmin Forerunner 235 I was already a keen runner and had dabbled in recording my metrics on mobile phone apps such as Strava. With the rise in the popularity of Smart Watches and the unreliability of the results generated on apps recording through my iPhone, I decided to invest in a sharper and more precise recording tool.

Previously, a well measured route and a reliable analogue watch could provide runners with the time taken to cover a certain distance. The transformational element of Smart Watches such as the Garmin 235 is that it removes any need for calculation on the part of the runner. Time, distance, pace, calories are all recorded and displayed by the watch. This data is then stored in your Garmin account and can be accessed and analysed on the Garmin App on your smart phone. This means you can be energetic with running, while lazy with mental arithmetic.

The increase in affordable Smart Watches has caused a shift in the average person becoming more conscious of their health and activity¹. How often do we hear someone saying they need to get their ‘10,000’ recommended step amount? Did anyone truly know what a ‘healthy’ heart rate was before your Smart Watch persistently alerted you? Further to the activity trackers, Smart Watches also keep us in the loop if linked to a Smart Phone. This means we never miss a phone call or a ‘Breaking News’ story.

For me the Garmin Watch is a tool to improve my running, much as a Zoom recorder is for audio recordings, Gimp is for editing photos and a Digital Camera is for taking photos. These tools greatly enhanced our ability to complete a task, this can feel transformational as we are able to take our skills or hobbies to new heights.

On the Garmin 235, running is not the only activity that can be recorded. Swimming, cycling, rock climbing and a conventional ‘work out’ at the gym can all be measured. This range of available activities also encourages the user to diversify their exercise habits and try new forms of sport. In terms of the social aspect, adding your runs onto a platform like Strava, where you can also view the activities of those you follow in your feed, means there is a lot of encouragement. Users can give ‘Kudos’ to their followers and leave comments on their activities. This all increases the sense of community that one would not normally have access to when taking part in a solo run.

As newer versions of the Garmin watch are released, the older models will soon cease to be supported. This will render the model obsolete, but the idea of a Smart Watch for recording activity will only continue to adapt and prevail. Though the outdated model will be recycled or traded in, the data generated by the watch will always remain, either on my Strava profile, or the Garmin account itself. This has the motivational aspect of looking back at your stats of previous runs to see how far you’ve come!

¹Ghananci, Juned, 7 Reasons Why a Smartwatch can be Beneficial for your health with AI, https://becominghuman.ai/7-reasons-why-a-smartwatch-can-be-beneficial-for-your-health-with-ai-27e994620b10

Mixtapes and mixed feelings

Cassette tape and player/recorder.
Photos from Unsplash and Pexels

In the late 1990s, I had moved to a new country and had started learning English through picture cards and songs. Ms Ushi, my English teacher, introduced me to music by Jack David, apparently ‘one of America’s foremost children’s recording artists’, according to his online bio. Ms Ushi’s daughter and I bonded quickly over these songs, humming at first and eventually singing and wiggling along to riveting hits such as ‘Cozy Bug Twist’ and ‘Mookie Pookie Choo-Choo’. We would often end class or play dates with the last song on the tape: ‘Hasta Luego (When You Don’t Want to Say Goodbye)’.

Back then, cassette tapes and players were a means of music discovery and recording for me. (CDs were around too, but I will focus on cassette tapes here.) As a nosy kid poking around the house, I occasionally found random cassette tapes lying around, the musical range of which spanned ABBA and The Eagles to classical music and Korean pop from the 1980s. I sat by the radio from time to time to record songs I wanted to hear again. Sometimes I messed up the timing and would record over the wrong part of the tape and lose precious audio. Making personalised, cheesy mixtapes for your crush or your friends was also a thing. Cassette tapes and microcassetts were part of answering machines, capable of playing a short pre-recorded message as well as recording incoming voicemail.

The first tape recorder debuted at the Berlin Radio Show in Germany in 1935 and became commercially widespread when Philips came up with a compact cassette in 1963 along with a cassette player.[1] Before this, there were record players, portable stereos, and reel-to-reel audio tape recording systems but, in comparison, cassette tapes and players were much smaller and therefore easier to carry and use.

A couple of other objects picked by my tutor group members involved audio as well: headphones and handheld Zoom recorders. It seems as though technological obsolescence is inevitable as audio technologies quickly evolve and have now become less physical (I guess increasingly cloud- and subscription-based, and played via smart phones and smart watches). Migration and adaptation seem to be necessary to capture and preserve aural material although, of course, this may modify the quality of its content, and it certainly modifies its form and context.

Following a quick Google search I found, to my surprise, that Jack David had digitised his music. As of today, his music is accessible to anyone via his website. Furthermore, his album has been catalogued and is discoverable on WorldCat, and one of his songs is even on Youtube. I am not sure whether it is necessary or worth preserving children’s music made in the 1980s for the broader public, but I was certainly excited to stumble into tracks from my childhood online. And, apparently, someone at WorldCat has deemed this particular cassette tape worthy of preservation and cataloguing.

In general, I think the audio on cassette tapes should be migrated, but not all cassette tapes need to be discarded. This is due not only to nostalgia, but I would argue that the homemade-quality of the sound, its physical form, and the experience of pressing buttons to instantly play and record on tape is, in my opinion, a unique instance in music history.

[1] ‘Total Rewind: 10 Key Moments in the Life of the Cassette’, The Guardian, 2013 <http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/aug/30/cassette-store-day-music-tapes> [accessed 26 October 2020].

The Netflix Revolution

One of the most exciting parts of my weekends as a child would be going to the local VHS rental store to pick a movie to watch. These tapes were bulky and stored in colourful cases that really appealed to my curiosity. Lithuania never had its own branch of the iconic (and now rather infamous) Blockbuster, so I had to make the most of the local independent store. There was not a lot of choice, and often most of the “good” movies would already be rented, while newer releases demanded a higher price. You could only rent a tape for three days at a time and late fees applied.

Once rented out, I remember having to flip the tape in my VHR player midway through the movie, which sounds very archaic in today’s day and age. There was also a brief sense of suspension when playing the cassette for the first time to see whether it actually worked, or if it was damaged from previous use. Lithuania did not produce many movies itself at the time, so I was mainly renting Hollywood movies in English. That brought on an additional frustration over the frequent lack of close captioning or subtitle options as I was just beginning to learn English at the time.

Then one day, in the early-2000s, I picked up a copy of I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997), and the store assisstant told me that I did not need to bring it back – ever. The VHS tapes were going out of business, although I did not know at that time what was going to replace them. To a seven-year-old, this was akin to being handed the keys to the candy shop. I picked up as many VHS tapes as my allowence permitted and felt really proud of myself for being so savvy.

As the VHS tapes became obsolete, I was relegated to buying DVDs (there was no rental store for them in my local shopping centre), and my budget restricted me in terms of how many of them I could afford. There was always the risk of buying a movie and not enjoying it, which made me cautious and extremely selective. Hence watching the TV seemed like the best option at the time, although the movies on offer were tediously repetitive – every year, there would be a rerun of classics like Home Alone (1990), The Mummy (1999) and the Titanic (1997), which meant that I learned them almost by heart.

I did not discover Netflix until I came to Glasgow in 2014, as it is not as popular a service in Lithuania. This was an eye-opening experience for me – I could watch anything I wanted from a vast library of movies, and get smart recommendations based on my viewing history. No ads, no limits, no viruses, no downloading – all for a small monthly subscription fee. I thought it was the greatest thing since sliced bread.

In retrospect though, Netflix had more significance to me than just providing me with an unlimited access to movies and TV shows. It also gave me an opportunity to immerse myself in the Western culture. Shows like Breaking Bad (2008-2013), Black Mirror (2011-2019) and the many true crime documentaries gave me a glimpse at what was popular among Western people, as well as shedding light on some of the social issues that are relevant to them. Programmes like the Peep Show (2003-2015) got me accustomed to the British vernacular (as opposed to the standard English I was taught at school). Netflix truly helped me bridge the cultural gap and understand the locals better.

Netflix is also just a brilliant piece of software that transformed all of entertainment. In fact, millions of people around the world could not imagine their lives without it, and this dependance only strengthened during the COVID pandemic. It is truly nothing short of a cultural revolution, and I am fully on board with it.

Transformational Technology: Like Music To My Ears

Having been tasked to write a blog post for the group work we had done in class, where I had to write about a digital technology I consider transformative for my life, I was stuck as to how I would write about my chosen object.

There are several technologies that I could have selected, some more relevant to others. However, as everybody slowly figured out how to work the new Miro (an online whiteboard tool), I was trying to figure out how to move the cursor. Finally, I managed to solve it, but realised that I had only two minutes left. Panicked, I went for the first thing I thought of, an old reliable.

*An illustrated image of a pair of headphones, my ‘old reliable’*

I love music. Its effect on my life has been transformational, as it has not only helped me form connections with other people that enjoy the same music as me, but it has also allowed me to lead a happier, more fulfilling life. There are several health benefits of listening to music, such as a study in 2006 that found music reduced pain, depression and disability.

In line with this love for music, a familiar sight to people when they see me are the headphones that I religiously wear. They are a constant feature as I listen to and love music every step of the way I take outdoors, or every commute that I need to take on public transport. Even just as I go about day-to-day tasks at home, I can assure you that I am listening to music through my headphones.

So, in terms of digital objects that I could pick that have had a transformational impact on my life, a pair of headphones are a rather good choice. However, how I would connect this to matters of digital preservation I had no idea.

Yet, the more I considered the features of a digital object as headphones the more I was able to analyse its qualities.

With no doubt, the transformational effect on my life from headphones was that of an experiential nature. Through my headphones, I can experience the listening of music and the greater effect that has on my life, such as the reduction of stress. No matter what digital music platform I have used throughout the past to listen to music, it is the analogue device of my headphones that have been a constant to the transformational power of music in my life.

Similarly, I noted that most of the digital objects that the rest of my tutorial group had picked were also analogue in nature. What does this say about the nature of digital objects and technological obsolescence?

I believe that this demonstrates that despite the technological ‘marvels’ of digital media, analogue media is still extremely important due to their existence as tangible, generally robust objects that have value assigned to them. Despite the faults with analogue objects, digital objects are subjected to a cycle of becoming outdated by newer technology, such as media, formats, software and hardware. Although my headphones are similarly in danger of becoming outdated to new models, this is a different concern from that of the software I use to play my music.

For example, unlike the analogue device I use to play my music, the music platforms themselves are listed on the DPC Bit List (named as Digital recordings published via cloud-based music sharing platforms), and are listed as vulnerable due to the recognition of the difficulties to preserve the materials in this group.

So, as I sit here writing the conclusion to this blog post, I am still listening to music through the headphones that I am currently wearing. It is likely that in the years to come, I will still be listening to music through a pair of headphones, no matter what model or design they will come in. However, it is the digital platform that I am listening to the music through that is the one in danger of obsolescence. In the years to come, I surely will be listening to music through a pair of headphones, but what means I will be listening to that music through is a mystery.

Sources:

Digital Preservation Coalition , Bit List (2020) <https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/champion-digital-preservation/bit-list> [accessed 26 October 2020].

Harvard Men’s Health Watch, Music and health (2011) <https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/music-and-health> [accessed 26 October 2020].

Transformational Technology: Sibling Bonding Through Video Games

As is the case with most siblings, my relationship with my brother was tumultuous in our younger years. The only thing that could curb this, and give our parents some peace, was our shared Nintendo 64.

Originally released in 1996, the Nintendo 64 was Nintendo’s answer to the Sony PlayStation and Sega Saturn. Despite being the proxy through which some of the most well-loved games of all time could be played, there are many problems associated with it. For one, it used cartridges instead of discs, meaning a much lower amount of memory. For another, Nintendo released far fewer games for it compared to the PlayStation and Saturn, with relatively few ever becoming popular. Thirdly, many of the games were aimed at pre-teens, meaning a large part of the market remained uninterested in what the Nintendo 64 could provide.

Since my brother and I were under ten, however, none of this mattered to us. We could, and did, spend hours fighting, but all of that went away the moment we sat down to play. He’s four years older, meaning he was better than me at most things by the annoying virtue of having more experience. That made the rare times I bested him all the better. There were other consoles out—but all we had were handhelds which aren’t particularly conductive to co-operative or PVP play. The Nintendo 64 gave my brother and I a reason to just have fun. Even if we still ended up yelling a lot, it never stopped us from picking up the controller the next time, and it introduced me to a lifelong hobby. I’ve spent years connecting and competing with my friends via video games—and I’ve gotten a lot better at beating my brother.

Consoles and the technology have long since moved on, though my brother still has our original Nintendo 64. He even occasionally plays it. Yes, after twenty years, it still works… other than the times the screen turns bright green and the only way to fix it is to turn it off then on again. We have no idea why it happens.

Nowadays, I prefer my Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 (and lack of random green screen), but that doesn’t change the fond memories I have of playing with my brother. The Nintendo 64 lives on in many ways, with remasters of its most popular series being added to contemporary consoles, while games like Super Mario 64, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, GoldenEye, and Conker’s Bad Fur Day still have influence decades later.

Does it deserve to be preserved? I believe so. Video games are interactive stories, and if we can preserve art forms like books and films, why shouldn’t we preserve video games as well? There are complications with technology as old as this: lost code, degeneration, obsolescence, pieces thrown away to make room for the next, newest model. But there’s also a huge online community dedicated to preserving and allowing access to these old games (as well as my brother still actually having the console itself). While the graphics and controls may be atrocious by today’s standards, they were once revolutionary, and they take nothing away from the joy I felt playing as a child.

The Versatility of the Zoom Recorder

Handheld Zoom recorders have been used by musicians, podcast hosts, filmmakers and so many other creative professionals for years. I had never heard of the technology until working as a graduate assistant at UNC Charlotte’s University Archives and Special Collections. I was working on interviewing black white couples in North Carolina for my thesis and reached out to our oral historian, Tina Wright, about best practices and guidance. She’s the one who introduced me to this versatile, handy recorder that oral historians had been using to record interviews for years.

Prior to learning about the technology, I was recording oral histories on my iPhone. This was less than ideal as the phone had to be so close to both me and the participants, it picked up so much background noise, videos drained the battery quickly, and most importantly, interviews took up so much storage space. I wanted the interviews to be as professional as possible as the Internal Review Board I’d appealed to knew I was hoping to have interviewees donate their interviews. The Zoom recorder changed my experience completely! Not only was I able to ensure a clear recording, but I could monitor microphone levels, pre-set metadata specs and upload the interviews directly to my Mac.

Zoom H4n Pro Handy — The Zoom H4n Pro I used to Record

I believe many my group’s choices for this particular exercise revolve around technology and convenience. From easier ways to listen to music, watch media, and video chat, to free software used to edit photographs and GPS technology made handily available in a watch. The convenience factor is even used as a marketing tool to sell these new technologies. Our choices also trace technological obsolescence as things like cassette players and VHS tapes have been replaced by music and video streaming services. It’s even becoming uncommon to have a DVD collection that you continue to add to, as movies and shows can be purchased online.

In the case of the zoom recorder I would argue it isn’t the technology itself that needs to be preserved, it’s the files in which it produces. I used it to record interviews in 24-bit audio WAV files which is what most oral history authorities want for preservation. Many of those interviews are archived and available online at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. Born digital media allows archivists to easily accession a file format they’re used to working with, create the metadata and quickly make it publicly accessible. And Zoom recorders continue to get better with each type and version produced. The device itself was so good that I ended up purchasing my own recorder and did several interviews with elderly relatives. I’ve also snuck it into music gigs and used it to record important phone conversations with fellow archivists. I feel this is a type of media that will continue to develop and change in the future, but not become obsolete anytime soon.

Lessons from Katrina: What Climate Change Means for Archival Planning

In 2005, the United States experienced one of the most devastating storms to ever hit the country: Hurricane Katrina. The result was thousands of lives lost and hundreds of billions of dollars in damage. No disaster management plan could have mitigated the damage to libraries, archives and special collection repositories. The American Library Association estimates hundreds of libraries were affected, with extensive damage to Tulane’s Howard-Tilton Memorial Library.[1] In the wake of such an extreme weather event, climate scientists and archivists began to collaborate on research that would help institutions better prepare for the increasing natural disasters linked to climate change. That research would lead an archivist at the University of Cincinnati to create a monitoring system for archives in the south east to track their potential exposure to Hurricane Florence in the days leading up to the storm’s landfall.

The 2018 study ‘American archives and climate change’ was conducted by archivists working in conjunction with the geography department at Pennsylvania State University. Their goal was to highlight risk based geographic areas that would continue to be affected by climate change—specifically water-related impacts such as sea level rise, storm surge, humidity and precipitation changes. The resulting study exposed archivists’ need for local climate data to better inform disaster planning. The authors noted ‘archives have received less attention in the climate risk literature’ possibly because collections can be moved and stored differently.[2] However, archivists cannot plan for factors they are not aware exist (e.g. preparing for water damage from flooding is completely different than having an awareness that your repository could be affected by storm surge).[3]

Eira Tansey was awarded a grant by the Society of American Archivists to ‘identify, gather, standardize, and make publicly accessible United States archival repository location data’.[4] In September of 2018, when it was predicted that Hurricane Florence would make landfall in the southern United States, Tansey used her project and work on the climate change study to create a set of maps showing archival repository locations in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, with NOAA’s updates on the storm’s potential path every ten minutes.

VA, NC, SC, GA Archives in the Path of Hurricane Florence

Tansey’s work was also personal, having worked as an archivist at Tulane University in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. [5]

‘I saw how the hurricane impacted different archives there… As a profession, we don’t necessarily understand all the risks right now. We know there are going to be a lot more disasters in the future, so how do we protect our collections in light of that knowledge?’
Pacific Standard Magazine, 2018

Ultimately, collaboration was key to both the climate change study and to Eira Tansey’s blog, which helped to create networks amongst smaller archives and share resources in the aftermath of Hurricane Florence. A complete crisis management plan should include local resources for preservation and conservation of damaged collections and Tansey’s mapping system linked communities of archivists in different geographic locations. Often its assumed that archivists have to be reactive in the case of natural disasters but this work is proving that better access to information about climate change can lead to a more informed disaster plan.

[1]Libraries and Hurricane Katrina (2020) <http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/cro/cropages/katrina/katrina#:~:text=After%20hundreds%20of%20libraries%20were,to%20all%20types%20of%20libraries.> [accessed 8 October 2020].

[2] Tara Mazurczyk, Nathan Piekielek, Eira Tansey, Ben Goldman, ‘American archives and climate change: Risks and adaptation’, Climate Risk Management, 20, (2018), 111-125.

[3] Ibid., p. 112.

[4] Eira Tansey , Tracking Hurricane Florence (2018) <https://repositorydata.wordpress.com/2018/09/12/tracking-hurricane-florence/> [accessed 8 October 2020].

[5] Sophie Yeo, How to Protect Rare Books and Manuscripts from the Ravages of Climate Change (2018) <https://psmag.com/environment/saving-our-archives-from-climate-change> [accessed 8 October 2020].

The Truth Is Out There: FOIA and the Calvine UFO sighting

In 1990, one of the most famous UFO sightings in Britain occurred over the Scottish village of Calvine. Thirty years have passed since then, meaning the photos taken by two unsuspecting hikers of the event are due to be released into public record on January 1 2021. However, the Ministry of Defence has recently halted this progression, extending the classified status of the dossier until 2072. As a result, a complaint has been lodged under the Freedom of Information Act and the Information Commissioner’s Office is investigating, but what exactly does this all mean?

Despite the unusual nature of this story, as the photos of the event were confiscated at the time of the sighting, they are bound by the same rules as most files the government produces. The Freedom of Information Act, FOIA for short, was introduced in the UK in the year 2000 and covers all recorded information held by public authorities. Essentially, any public authority, including the government, are obliged to publish the records detailing their activities. This can include things such as printed documents, computer files, letters, emails, photographs, and sound or video recordings. Scotland operates under a more straightforward version that was implemented in 2002, where ease of access is emphasised, but the broad aims of the Act remains the same: to give the public a way to make informed decisions about the authorities that run the country and improve trust in those responsible for the inner machinations.

Beliefs about the nature of life in the universe are more subjective than not, so what use is hiding these images when plenty of similar, readily available images already exist online? I make no claims to what the records of this event might contain, nor do I think their contents so important when held against the fact the government is picking and choosing how they are subject to the rules of FOIA. There are reasons these rules exist. If they can be broken, how is there supposed to be trust in the systems and archivists meant to uphold them?

As pointed out by Paul Gibbons, ‘Prior to FOIA, the public was expected to wait until records became available in a record office to dig behind a public authority’s official pronouncements—that, or rely on somebody leaking them.’ In an age dominated by internet and information, transparency is a vital component for organisations, and the FOIA was created to uphold this, as well as provide guidelines for archivists to use when releasing information. Officially, people wanting to see records don’t even need to give a reason for requesting them. Instead, it is on the public authority to explain why they wish to withhold them, which, in the case of Calvine, the MOD and The National Archives have so far refused to do.

Additionally, concurrent to the FOIA is the 30-year rule—officially known as The Public Records Acts 1958 and 1967. After 30 years, records are categorized as historical, therefore subject to different rules. In 2009, this rule was reduced to 20 years, and the last decade has been spent applying this rule. It is due to be completely in effect in 2022, when the records from 2001-2002 will be published by The National Archives.

The National Archive building in London. Image Credit: Flickr

When sent to The National Archives, the records will be examined and it will be decided whether or not they are opened. The only reason for them to remain closed is if an exemption to the FOIA applies. There are twenty three exemptions, a full list of which are available in a pamphlet released by The National Archives. Further, and more importantly, there are two specific kinds of exemption: absolute and qualified. The former refers to the minority of exemptions and means that once the exemption is applied, whoever is in possession of the records is under no obligation to publicly publish them. The latter ‘are subject to a public interest test’. If there is reasonable reason to presume that public interest is high enough to warrant the release of the records, then the public authority must still allow access to them.

Regardless of what the photos taken above Calvine contain, under the FOIA, it is still reasonable to object to the fact these records will not be published. The 30-year rule, its newly established 20-year update, and their most of their exemptions cease to apply once the timeframe has passed. The photos are now historical records and should be treated as such.

There is, however, one sticking point. The dossier also contains personal information on the hikers who took the photos whose identities remain unknown. It is possible, in an effort to protect their privacy, these records have been given a 50 year extension. It still does not explain why no authority will comment on their reasons for denying access.

As Trundle and Kaplonski assert, archives ‘… are continually created and modified, and, despite common conceptions of them as a repository of the dead, are living things.’ This case is a fantastic example of that. The past affects the present always, and whether or not there really was a UFO spotted above a small Scottish village 30 years ago, people deserve to understand why the records of the event is being denied them.

_{Birkinshaw, Patrick, ‘Freedom of information and its impact in the United Kingdom’ <https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0740624X10000559#s0030> [Accessed: 15^th October 2020]}

_{Gibbons, Paul. ‘Back to the FOIA: how FOIA affects historical records’ <https://www.foiman.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/201804-backtofoia.pdf> [Accessed: 15^th October 2020]}

_{Information Commissioner’s Office, ‘What is the Freedom of Information Act?’ https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-freedom-of-information/what-is-the-foi-act/> [Accessed: 14^th October 2020]}

_{Sims, Paul. 2020. ‘Government bans release of secret UFO dossier for another 50 years leaving experts furious’ in The Sun <https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/12892883/secret-ufo-sightings-dossier-stay-hidden/> [Accessed: 11^th October 2020]}

_{The National Archives. 2016. ‘Freedom of Information exemptions’ <https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/information-management/freedom-of-information-exemptions.pdf> [Accessed: 14^th October 2020]}

_{The University of Edinburgh. 2019. ‘Freedom of information in Scotland and the rest of the UK’ <https://www.ed.ac.uk/records-management/guidance/information-legislation/foi/scotland-uk> [Accessed: 15^th October 2020]}

_{Trundle, Catherine, and Chris Kaplonski. 2011. ‘Tracting the Political Lives of Archival Documents’ in History and Anthropology, 22:4 <https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02757206.2011.626777> [Accessed: 15^th October 2020]}

Observing the Uncensored Library experience: what can be learned from unconventional methods of digital data preservation?

The Uncensored Library, courtesy of https://uncensoredlibrary.com/en

Originally developed by Mojang Studios,“Minecraft” was initially released for Windows, OS X and Linux to the general public on November 18th 2011. Over the course of ten years, the game has greatly widened its audience, being released also on other popular gaming systems such as Playstation and Xbox due to its enormous success. To give a brief idea on how popular the game has become, it will suffice to mention that, to this day, it has sold around 200 million copies worldwide, with 126 million people playing monthly. But what does this game have to do with archiving and digitisation?

The Uncensored Library Island, courtesy of https://uncensoredlibrary.com/en

Minecraft falls under the category of “sandbox” games, which typically have no linear story to follow, but are rather devised to encourage players to play freely and explore the world they have in store. In fact, a core component of the game is the process of “crafting” objects such as tools to shape the virtual world according to the players’ wishes. While more often than not this directly translates into leisure projects of a small to large scale (see for example 1), there has been a very interesting instance in which the game has been used to store digital content that would have otherwise been censored or lost. This is the case of the so-called “Uncensored Library”.

The Making of the Uncensored Library, courtesy of https://www.blockworks.uk/

This digital library was built inside the game by the UK based company ‘blockworks’ for Reporters Without Borders (RSF). They commissioned this project – the building of the architectural structure of the library within a server owned by them – in order to protect the endangered texts, as well as to promote the importance of the free press among the youngest. This was not Blockworks’ first project connected with cultural heritage: in 2017, for example, it worked in collaboration with the V&A and the Royal Albert Hall Museum to create accessible museum experiences that would involve young people at every stage. Embedded below you will find a video from the company explaining briefly the purpose and motivations behind this. The video also offers some good shots of the library and its surroundings.

The Uncensored Library – The Film, courtesy of https://uncensoredlibrary.com/en

The Uncensored Library holds 200 journal articles that are considered illegal in the Country where each of them was originally written. They are arranged according to Country of origin, with a dedicated wing for Russia, Mexico, Vietnam and Saudi Arabia. The library makes a point of remembering and honouring the lives of journalists killed because of what they wrote, such as Javier Valdez and Jamal Khashoggi. Aside from preserving their texts, within this space one can also find altars and memorials dedicated to the fallen journalists. Considering how, in certain Countries, freedom of information is very limited by the State’s control over the press, or even through the purposeful obscuring of the websites, the solution offered by the Uncensored Library presents a precious caveat that makes these resources accessible to all, despite the censorship. In fact, while the texts may be censored or banned in any of these countries, the game still remains accessible in all of them.

Accessibility is perhaps a key word when talking about this experience: anyone who owns a copy of the game can freely enter this server and explore the content of the library with no limitations. Moreover, if accessed from Window, OS X or Linux, the entirety of the texts can be permanently downloaded on the system. In addition to this, RSF has made the whole server downloadable (but not alterable) so that, even in case it might get permanently banned, anyone could reupload it with ease, making the actual censoring of these contents almost impossible.

Free Press Index in the Uncensored Library, courtesy of https://uncensoredlibrary.com/en

There is no archivist or librarian figure at the head of this project: the criteria for the inclusion of the texts are handled directly by RSF. According to an interview with James Delaney, managing director at blockworks, the NGO wants to ensure that “the library’s content is accurate, truthful, and sensitive”. Furthermore, he also states that the purpose of this project is something that they wanted to be meaningful “beyond flashy minecraft”. While the actual appraisal criteria are not explicitly stated nor made transparent beyond this statement, the process of digitisation seems quite straightforward: the RSF will apply the approved texts to the digital books crafted within the game through Minecraft’s commands. No one aside from RSF, Blockworks and the game developers would be able to modify or alter the content of the library.

This solution is, of course, only temporary – its purpose being to spread culture to the single users in order to ensure the preservation of the texts within their own systems. Although RSF may wish for the project to last as long as it possibly can, the truth is that the library will only exist as long as the Minecraft servers stay online. There are, of course, other limitations imposed by this choice. As this server (and the game in general) were never made with archiving purposes in mind, there is no real way of retaining any essential metadata, nor is any of its content authentic per se. However, the simplicity of this system, though flawed, might show that there can be alternative ways to preserve digital data, especially in the case of information that is as political and controversial as the previously mentioned journal articles.

While it is not my suggestion to let a private company have total control over conspicuous amounts of critical information, nor that the game itself is a valid alternative to archiving softwares, I believe that the methodologies here employed would be worth exploring in order to find cheaper and longer lasting resolutions to preservation issues. Furthermore, it has already been proved how effective this method is against government-enforced censorship. Megan Ward once defined the digital archive as a “reactive entity”, one that is deeply affected by the impact of postmodernism, especially in its awareness of the problematic role of its physical counterpart in support of the Empire. It would therefore be quite appropriate for the evolution of digital archives to be mindful of any possible medium that could prevent that from happening again, or, as in this case, even fight against it.

Uncensored Library Fist, courtesy of https://uncensoredlibrary.com/en

Typically, archive management relies on open source systems such as the famous AtoM (“Access to Memory), or ArchivesSpaces, which are dynamic web-based applications used for improving archival organisations to have more control over their collections. Archives will also make use of Management Information Systems (MIS) to encode and integrate metadata, as well as provide administrative and statistical reports. Could these traditional systems be combined with the unconventional preservation methods offered by a game-server model such as Minecraft’s? While there are no answers to that just yet, one can only strive to improve and increase the collaboration opportunities between these very different fields of work, hoping that they could achieve positive results for the preservation of data.

Sources:

Reporters without Borders, The Uncensored Library, (2020) <https://uncensoredlibrary.com/en> [last accessed 09/10/20]

Bountouri, Lina. Archives in the Digital Age: standards, policies and tools. (Oxford: Chandos Publishing, 2017), pp.23-27.

Ward Megan, and Wisnicki S. Adrian. “The Archive after Theory.” In Debates in the Digital Humanities 2019, edited by Gold Matthew K. and Klein Lauren F., 200-06. Minneapolis; London: University of Minnesota Press, 2019.

The Verge, Minecraft still incredibly popular as sales top 200 million and 126 million play monthly, (2020) <https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/18/21262045/minecraft-sales-monthly-players-statistics-youtube> [last accessed 16/10/20]

The Verge, This Minecraft Library is Making Journalism Accessible All Over the World, (2020) <https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/18/21184041/minecraft-library-censored-journalism-reporters-without-borders> [last accessed 16/10/20]