David Duce (Oxford Brooks University): The Nature of the Problem

Notes by Kristy Davis ... Background – digital objects are just ‘bits’; hardware and operating systems are subject to change that presents a challenge for continuous access.  There is a longevity issue with digital art ‘bits’ lasting only around 50+ years compared to the longer lasting cave and oil paintings.  Example of how a logo changed for a conference website with the first version in 2001 and over time there have been over 20 logo sequences. Not straightforward to preserve and the experience of viewing digital animation changes over time. Various approaches such as migration to new media and/or file formats, emulation that replicates original look and feel on modern hardware, and the Universal Virtual Computer. However, there are risks in preserving with hardware. Presented several models and case studies: national Archives Australia, JISC, etc. Issues raised were lack of fixity, dynamic of a work, formal elements and authenticity that leads to the question ‘what really is the work?’ Mentioned the need to document why an object is being preserved and precisely why it’s being preserved in a particular way. Part of the problem is uncertainty and speculation on what it might be in the future. Mentions that cultural heritage is particularly challenging since what is the original, how is it recorded, used and its significance. Mentioned meta knowledge such as CIDOC-CRM standards and to encode metadata about historical artefacts by recording events. For the future, ideas of digital forensics and ideas of pieces of evidence and historical process applications to capture digital artefacts. The pitfalls are: knowledge as interpretation of evidence that can be ambiguous.

See presentation here (link to follow)