Storing Text
If the desire for immortality is one of the feelings motivating our efforts to (in Shelley’s phrase) “stamp our thoughts on lifeless things,” then what is likely to be the societal angst of the digital generation and its legacy?
The digital generation’s societal angst for its legacy can come from a number of sources. Firstly, with the rate at which technology changes, how do we ensure that the system we create to store and archive information and creative artefacts, aka the “universal library”, will not become antiquated in a short time and rend access unattainable? It wasn’t that long ago that we were saving everything on floppy disks. Information saved to a floppy, and not copied to a more current format, is pretty much gone. It is only since the 5th century that we have made an effort to preserve written texts (O’Donnell, 1993). According to Kelly( 2006), humans have published at least 32 million books; and this does not include the million of articles, essays, songs, images and other artefacts that have been published since the days of Sumerian cuneiform tablets. We are not even taking into account all the writing that has not been published officially. The sheer volume of product is mind boggling. We need a system that has the capacity and the requisite technology to accommodate this desire to preserve the past. O’Donnell (1993) states, “one of the most valuable functions of the traditional library has been not its inclusivity but its exclusivity, its discerning judgment that keeps out as many things as it keeps in “ which helps to avoid “infochaos.” But, do we need to save everything/ and who is going to decide what is important and what is not? Is it only published works that will be saved? Why do we cling so tightly to the past?
I must agree that the idea of all published works being available as “a single liquid fabric of interconnected words and ideas” (Kelly, 2006, p.4) is extremely appealing because of its seeming effortlessness and expansive access. However, I have to agree with Grafton (2007) that the original form of a document can tell us things that an online image cannot, as our other senses are able to interact with it. Which brings me to my second concern, which is the loss of the physical object itself. I like books. I like the feel of them, the look of them, the smell of them. I like to hold them and leaf through their pages, skipping here and there at random. I can’t do this in the same way online. Sure, there are links online, but many a time I have gotten so far from my original topic that I couldn’t even find my way back. A book is self-contained while the internet is seemingly infinite and frequently overwhelming. Sometimes it is just too much work.
A third concern is the copyright issue which, in its current state, appears to “exist primarily to protect a threatened business model” (Kelly, 2006, p.5) and not as incentive to keep creators working. Many millions of orphaned works are abandoned by publishers due to ambiguous copyright ownership or lack of profitability. Does a copyright law that ensures ownership for 70 years really encourage creativity and invention in future generations? And does such a law really work with the current technological environment?
References
Grafton, A. “Future Reading: Digitalization and its Discontents”. New York Times 5 November 2007. Print.
Kelly, K. “Scan this book!” New York Times 14 May 2006. Print.
O’Donnell, J.J. (1998). Avatars of the word: From papyrus to cyberspace. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Image Source: https://birdswithteeth.wordpress.com/2012/02/21/the-library-of-alexandria-and-the-feral/
I think you have made some great points, and you defiantly raised questions that I am also concerned with. With the rapid advancements of technology I wonder if there will be anything to show future historians about our time or if we have entered into another “Dark Age”.
While researching I enjoy the linked nature of information, it’s so easy just to click on the reference you want to explore next. Add to that the fact that the internet is always ‘open’, want to do some research Sunday night at 10? No problem. At the same time it’s nice to see the object itself. I do find the most annoying part of my e-reader is that I am stuck reading sequentially unless I want to spend a lot of time moving forwards and backwards. Not a lot of help when you are trying to refer back to a passage.
Catherine
Hi Catherine,
A agree with your last point. Though I do like the built in dictionary feature and the search feature that these devices offer. I am not one for highlighting a lot of text so I often forget where I saw something. The search feature can help me find things quickly without having to slog through pages of text.
Hello Susan.
You make some interesting points and raise some difficult questions which I will address with less academic acumen then they deserve.
What is likely to be the societal angst of the digital generation and its legacy? If the angst of Shelly’s age was immortality, then I believe the digital generation will worry about obscurity or oblivion. These days, everyone can get published and it seems likely that storage of the information we create will continue to improve. The problem this and future generations face is how to sift through the growing collection of information that is available. I am reminded of Borges’s short story The Library of Babel in which the universe is symbolised by a seemingly infinite library. He writes, “This much is already known; for every sensible line of straightforward statement, there are leagues of senseless cacophonies, verbal jumbles and incoherences.” In an infinite library there is necessarily a book that contains the fundamental truths. The difficulty is in finding it amongst the rubbish and recognizing it once we find it.
Do we need to save everything and who is going to decide what is important and what is not? I believe we do not need to save everything but at the same time, the decision about what will be saved will be spread out over a vast network. I am thinking about systems like torrents that collect disparate bits of data from multiple sources and then assemble them into a coherent whole. Who is deciding what is available? It appears to be private citizens and/or consumers. The demand for certain items insures that the download will be fast but it only takes one computer somewhere in the world to preserve something that others can eventually attain.
Is it only published works that will be saved? I think the growth of blogs show that it is not just published works that will get saved. There seems to be a multitude of informal and unpublished work available on the internet.
Why do we cling so tightly to the past? I love this question but dare not attempt an answer in this forum.
Does a copyright law that ensures ownership for 70 years really encourage creativity and invention in future generations? I am not sure how to approach this question in an unbiased way. I feel like copyright law is not encouraging creativity or invention. However, consider YouTube. How many inventors and artists have worked untold hours to produce something that they will never receive a dime for and anyone can “steal.” This tells me that the threatened business model is no longer an incentive in the current technological environment.
Thanks for the thought provoking post.
Hi Susan,
Your comments about the joy of actual books resonated with me. Both my teenage daughter and husband are voracious readers. Both have moved from traditional books to eBooks. They like the fact that they can access and read their books from many devices and that they can bring an entire library with them. They often scoff at the fact that I have not yet joined the eReader generation. While I have tried, it is just not the same. So I curl up with my book in my lap and enjoy the texture of the pages. Recently we went on our first camping trip of the season. Surprise! We were out of internet range! Also, soon the battery life on their devices ran low. Who still had a great book to read? Me! So perhaps there is still some good in old technology.
I am glad that you quoted O’Donnell (1993), with “one of the most valuable functions of the traditional library has been not its inclusivity but its exclusivity, its discerning judgment that keeps out as many things as it keeps in”. I will admit that, prior to these readings, I had not considered libraries as being “exclusive”, keeping things out. Limitations on budgets, storage space, maintenance staff, all certainly do play a role in the selection of library materials. The purging of books considered “out of date” after five years is a crying shame. At least the internet does help to open up increased resource and reference material. While I prefer my fiction books to be traditional hard / soft copy, I prefer non-fiction reference material to come from the internet. The opportunity to choose from a variety of current sources, rather than simply those that the library could afford or chose to keep, to be invaluable.
You ask the important question of “Who is going to decide what is important and what is not?” In the past, this was the job of the librarian. At least online, this can be the job of the individual author. If something is at risk of being deleted from a server, the author can save it in another location. After all, what is one person’s trash is another person’s treasure.
Hi Tina,
When you said “what is one person’s trash is another person’s treasure” made me laugh. When I was doing my family tree I remember being ecstatic when I found some trivial item with a family member’s name on it, be it a census report, a baptismal recording in a church log or a shipping passenger list. To me these are gold but I can see how they can be seen as trash and not worth saving to someone else. Taking this course also made me see that I will not necessarily find any written documents of family history past a certain point due to the low literacy rate at certain times and places in history.
Susan
“We need a system that has the capacity and the requisite technology to accommodate this desire to preserve the past.”
In this MET program I have learned about flipped and blended classrooms. Maybe it is possible to use these ideas to address the issues surrounding maintaining the ‘universal library’. You ask the deciding questions as to how libraries will survive. Who decides and what will be kept. The other three questions that need to be addressed are where, how and when. These questions need to be applied in unison if we are to solve this dilemma in an acceptable manner. I just say on the news how archeologists have uncovered what could be the oldest footprint in North America. Who knew this could cause such excitement! I also recall a joke about the only artifact to survive will be Post it notes.
We ‘cling’ to the past for one reason because we traditionally compare events, lifestyles, characteristics to identity who we are I the present. I think of space exploration and wonder what would it be like to start fresh with no or very little planet history? What a rough life that would be. I’m not sure I would want it.
“the original form of a document can tell us things that an online image cannot, as our other senses are able to interact with it.” This is so true about so many things. Copies don’t have the same paper quality or smell. And like paintings, the ‘seeing’ experience can be so much more, fuller. Seeing a reproduction of the Mona Lisa does not compare to seeing it life-size. I like to look closely to modern paintings in their unframed state to view the process history through the dripping paint. I am totally disappointed when an artist ‘whitewashes’ the edges all one colour removing the ‘personality’ of the work.
Stewart Brand gives us new hope in his article (Escaping the Digital Dark Age, Library Journal February 1, 1999) with ways to preserve some materials. The problem may be more on how to preserve the technology.
Catherine, when you mention Sunday night research I’m guessing you are thinking public libraries and not those at post-secondary institutions. I find that any items I find in the library online catalogue that is on the shelves, I can reserve for pick up the next day. And the online catalogue will also include the table of contents which allows me to check the viability of this resource material before I get to the steps.
And while I love the convenience of links and tool bar features to assemble research, the Post-It Note is my trusted companion when it comes to reading actual books (I could never highlight let alone underline in a book).
Stephen: “In an infinite library there is necessarily a book that contains the fundamental truths. The difficulty is in finding it amongst the rubbish and recognizing it once we find it.” And I’m guessing that precious book with the directions manual.
And, Susan, as far as doing your family genealogy, I worked in the oldest library in Canada and came to realize that those little tidbits of trivial information are indeed gold. They validate that simple, common folk existed- were real. We don’t need to be ‘important’ on the world stage to make a difference in society. If you have time, google the children in China who have no identity because they were second and third born under the one child law.
Terry