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By: Jennifer Gavin
The closing days of the year are always exciting here at the Library of Congress, because the Librarian of Congress names the 25 films that are this year’s selections to the National Film Registry, which designates films that are to be preserved for posterity due to their cultural, aesthetic and historical value. But keep in …
Posted in: Timeless
By: Mike Ashenfelder
(NOTE: This is a reprinted and updated article from our digitalpreservation.gov website.) The motion picture industry is rapidly changing from film to digital media and within the next decade most movies will be shot, edited, distributed and projected digitally. Yet even as the industry embraces new technology, they may not be doing enough to archive …
Posted in: The Signal
By: Susan Manus
(Note: In the interest of long term access, we will occasionally post material to The Signal that was previously published only on our website. The following is an updated version of an article from our “Meeting the Challenge” series.) Saving the nation’s cultural heritage is an increasingly important matter for government agencies that hold large …
Posted in: The Signal
By: Martha Anderson
The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is offering the opportunity for interested individuals and organizations to provide recommendations on approaches for ensuring long-term stewardship and encouraging broad public access to unclassified digital data that result from federally funded scientific research. Responses should be submitted by January 12, 2012. The National Digital …
Posted in: The Signal
By: Jeff Bridgers
We mark winter’s imminent arrival with a cover illustration by Will Hammell for a January 1914 issue of Puck. In the illustration, a cluster of snow-buntings appears to gambol in the wind-blown snow, perhaps inviting the warmly bundled woman to join them in embracing the season. Also known as snowbirds or snowflakes, snow-buntings brave even …
Posted in: Picture This
By: Mike Ashenfelder
Mike Wash is an engineer, technologist, inventor and visionary who holds 18 patents (search on the U.S. Patent Office site for “Wash; Michael L”), designed and implemented many of the standard automatic functions in modern digital and film cameras and — in an incredible feat of engineering — helped create a new data infrastructure for …
Posted in: The Signal
By: Jennifer Gavin
Here at the Library of Congress, we take in more than 10,000 items a working day – books, films, music, photographs. Many are the basic stuff of everyday research; some are rare items, especially beautiful, unusual or unique; and some are major treasures of the world, to be held and preserved for the knowledge and …
Posted in: Timeless
By: Butch Lazorchak
The following is a guest post by Carl Fleischhauer, a Digital Initiatives Project Manager in NDIIPP. In part 1 of this series, I sketched the background of the Library of Congress format sustainability Web site. This month we are pleased to announce the availability of 35 descriptions of digital geospatial formats and two brief accompanying …
Posted in: The Signal
By: Butch Lazorchak
The December 2011 Library of Congress Digital Preservation Newsletter is now available (PDF). In this issue: *Information about how the Library of Congress is archiving the 2012 Election campaign websites *Updates from the National Digital Stewardship Alliance Standards and Outreach Working Groups *An article about saving the record of American business *A recent meeting discussed …
Posted in: The Signal
By: Butch Lazorchak
The following is a guest post by Carl Fleischhauer, a Digital Initiatives Project Manager in NDIIPP. The Library has presented information about digital formats since 2004, intended to support preservation planning in our institution and in our sister archives. This is, of course, an open-ended activity: new formats come along with some regularity and, in …
Posted in: The Signal