Blog Site Changes!

I am experimenting with hosting this blog within my website. It will now be available at http://www.robincpike.com/socialavarchivist/.

Website Plan

Step one of my website update is relatively complete--I have created a new site under a new host.

Step two of my new site is is progress. I have switched http://www.robincpike.com/ to a new host. The DNS/CNAME switch was less tricky than last time, and has already been confirmed! I plan to maintain my Google Sites original site as an example of a free site under the generic URL http://sites.google.com/site/robincpike/, which is why I originally bought my domain, to have an example of this site for my project.

Step three will include migrating the rest of my content and migrating my blog. The current URLs should transfer, but it will all be under the robincpike.com domain. I've also migrated the Google Analytics tracking code. Let's hope that transfers smoothly.

Step four, create web tutorials.

Adopt a Film

A little while ago, we received the films we had preserved as a pilot project and now, I'm continuing another project, "Adopt a Film," coordinating with several university departments, namely the Office of University Development. The Archives is working to raise money for the preservation of deteriorating film from the 1930s to 1960s from the Department of Athletics. Mostly game films from football, track and field, and basketball, these films capture the moments during a period when CUA was highly competitive in these sports, moments that need to be preserved.

Alumni will be asked to donate money for the preservation of their legacy, and from what I hear, they're already excited!

Presentation Wrap-up

Last Thursday I gave a presentation for the WRLC (Washington Research Library Consortium) Spring Forum on audio preservation (digitization and digital preservation). I talked about the program I have worked on at the CUA Archives for the School of Music audio recordings, presenting a practical approach for digitization on a tight budget, doing what you can with what you have. I got a lot of great feedback, encouragement, and tips for the next steps. It's great to know I'm on the right track with this project!

The best part about this presentation is that it gave me a chance to reflect back on almost one year of progress on the project (I started working on it after the ARSC conference last year). Updates are available in the presentation.

The presentation slides and a video of all three presentations and the discussion panel will be available through the WRLC website, link to be posted soon.

Another Archive Going Digital

An interesting article from the Post--The Rolling Stone magazine archive is going digital (for a price), but it's going to be a great source of the history of cultural trends!

New Look Coming Soon

I'm in the process of giving robincpike.com a makeover and it will soon be moved to a new hosting server (not free, but totally affordable even for an archivist) so I can add "Web Tools For Archivists" tutorials that Google Sites (free) makes a bit clunky to create. You get what you pay for. This blog, which is currently separate from my site, will also be integrated into the main site. I'm also looking to add feeds onto my homepage--my blog, what blogs I like to read, etc.

What does this mean?

The URL for this blog will be changing, though the hosting service preserves old URLs, so those should (in theory) still work.

robincpike.com and social a/v archivist should still be indexed by search engines, and should still appear in their normal ranking. Google me. You'll see. Well, not yet.

I've already created an entire new section so I can add web tutorials for archivists, and might even integrate video. We'll see.

I will be blogging about these changes for the benefit of archivists or other people who'd like to do something similar.

Something Not A/V Related, but Tech

While getting ready this morning, I caught a quick segment of the Today Show. Normally, features during the 8am hour don't catch my attention, but this one was about mom blogs (a growing trend in overall blogging), but more importantly, blogging with integrity. The repercussions of negative, disrespectful, and anonymous blog comments have been in the news so it seems fitting to feature the site. I've had several different blogs over the past decade, writing about several different topics, and I've been involved in social networking sites since 2004. In my personal observations, it appears like the trend of anonymous rudeness on blogs and other social networking sites is unfortunately growing.

It amounts to this: be nice. :-)

Next On My Reading List...

I love mysteries, but I'm pretty excited that a colleague recommended this book. Frames (1 of 2 in a series that might be expanding) is about a UCLA film archivist that buys an old film house and discovers a skeleton amongst the nitrate reels! Can't wait to get it!

This makes me want to write my own murder in the stacks book.

It's Cool To See It In Print...

Another Resource

Thanks to the ARSC listserv, I have discovered another resource: http://digitalforward.net/. While there, check out their white paper.

Let's Talk Stock

Did you know that there are no longer any producers of magnetic audio tape (reel to reel)? Did you know that there is now only one producer of gold-standard CDs and DVDs (in the UK)? Did you know that VHS tape stock is probably the next to disappear?

Companies like Imation, 3M, and Sony have been shifting to producing electronic media and computer data tape, but no longer audio visual tape media. What does this mean for archivists?

1) Competing with collectors.
Do you know collectors? Have you actually talked to one? During grad school, collectors were presented as the obsessive patrons that lurk around special collections and try to steal your valuable (monetary or intrinsic) materials (as in The Island of Lost Maps). After meeting a lot of collectors at the ARSC conference last year, I realized that although they can be obsessive (but aren't we all?), they are usually ahead of archivists, predicting technological trends, especially when it comes to obsolescence. They collect prior to the format disappearing, rather than once the formats are no longer used prominently. If you want stock, start compiling it now because in another few years, it's not going to be accessible!

2) Re-thinking migration programs.
If your archive was fortunate enough to start an analog to analog carrier migration program, you'll no longer be able to buy new stock. Sure, you can buy old stock, stock that might be degraded as much as the tape you're trying to transfer. You can also buy re-purposed blank stock--tapes that have been used and are in good enough condition to be re-used. You could also redesign your migration program to go digital. Which brings us to...

3) Going digital!
Do you have a Content Management System (CMS)? Are you developing it? You're really going to need one unless you want a lot of files without metadata floating around on your server in a few years.

4) Developing digital standards.
Do the research. ARSC and AMIA have great technical guidelines and recommendations, but you need to find what will work practically for your archive.

5) Re-thinking grants.
Preservation grant standards have changed (or should be changing soon)! Analog to analog is dead. It's analog to digital or even digital to digital.

Some Interesting Articles

I was reading The Express (a portable version of The Washington Post) on my way to work this morning and stumbled upon a great story from the NBC Archives. I just love when old film is found and preserved.

I also found this article today, from the Houston Chronicle, via The Librarian's Guide to Etiquette. Shhh!

Archiving From Home

Over the weekend, I was still helping my boyfriend unpack his new condo, and we came across his three very large boxes of VHS tapes that have been packed since his move in Dec 2008. The plan was for one of his more tech-savvy friends to transfer them. Well, that hasn't happened yet, and now I've been recruited to find a cheap way of transferring these to a DVD-quality file (not archival-quality) on a hard drive.

I'm looking at some analog to digital converters, and software programs for him. He has a Mac, so it should be pretty easy to start, though it will take quite a while to complete. Though this machine/software doesn't say if it's Mac-compatible, it looks decent. The reviews are better than other converters, and I was wondering if anyone had used it, personally. I was also thinking of just going the easy route and buying a more simple piece of equipment.

The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year!

The CUA Music Library has a sale of duplicate or not necessary donation items every year, selling scores, books, CDs, and sheet music that are not needed for the collection. Last year the sale didn't have much for my taste, but the year before, I walked away with five flute pieces and one trio for flute and strings for under $20! I knew some of them were worth $40, alone!

Today, my purchases included several chamber scores, including flutes or recorders, two flute CDs, and a book on music in Soviet Russia (I love the dissonance in Russian music).

Spending Time With Tech Specs

I have not been actively posting the during the last week, not because I haven't done much in the way of archiving, but because I've been more social than a/v archivist.

I'm still working on audio metadata technical locations for the metadata specs the archives decided on, and I have been getting some great questions on processing and preservation specifics from students. I've had some recent moving image archive questions, which have me digging through the current specs for moving image archiving (what has changed in the last few months?!). In my leisure time, I've been working on amateur website development for archivists, which I hope will be a big hit at the SAA conference. I've gotten some good responses on the new a/v website, which is really encouraging for my own web development goals. Unfortunately, I have not had too much leisure time because I have been using my organizational skills to move; I didn't even take the time to plug in my external drive and back up my computer this week!

Issues In The Reel World

I spent the majority of today working on my audio reel set-up and transferred the first reel using the new set-up, the Mac, and Logic Express. It was also the first reel I had worked on that was recorded at 3 3/4. I thought everything was good to go (3 3/4 button depressed and everything) and when I started the digital transfer, I heard a chipmunk instead of a soprano! After messing with settings on the computer (because I thought I took care of everything on the hardware end), I finally listened to the recording through the reel player and discovered it wasn't doing what it was supposed to be doing. A colleague then found a great site for me, obsolete media, which has a manual for my reel player! After searching discovering that I had to remove a post sheath, and then not-so-gently coaxing a sheath off of a post that had not been removed in over decade, I got everything running again, the soprano started singing, and the digitization was running.

End of story? Not quite.

We got Logic Express for the great metadata it creates and allows. All of the administrative metadata is there, but I'm having trouble finding the menu to input descriptive metadata. There's always tomorrow!

This Reminds Me...

Two short articles.

From NPR's Picture Show: "Find Me A Dodo...". (This reminds me of a few requests I've gotten...)

From NPR's On The Media: "Librarians Gone Wild." (I can relate!)

A/V Website

After 1.5 years of work, developing my skills, and using two student assistants, the CUA Archives A/V Website went live today! The previous website is available as a screenshot in this post, for comparision.

Library 101

Weird guys, great web tools and tips for libraries, that can be expanded into archives!
Library 101

Warning: Audio Visual Archivist!

I found this today. All I can say is who created this, and how can I thank you?