i'm posting this article by victor keegan from the guardian largely because of the conversation we had in my preservation class the other day. the topic of the day was, theoretically, reformatting. really, most of the class was taken up with two things: microfilm and arguing about digitization. our professor is, somewhat unexpectedly, an absolute and total devotee of digitizing everything in sight because "that's what patrons expect."i have to admit, i had to bite my tongue to keep from commenting, "well, they can expect it all they want."
our professor was bound and determined that everyone expected everything to be digital all the time and we should really face up to this fact and do--- something. i'm not quite sure what he wanted us to do -- even just in terms of the class -- but he definitely expected something.
one of the other students and i tried rather gingerly to point out that maybe the expectations for digital collections were different depending on what field you were in and what kind of work you were doing -- and that didn't get us very far, but it slowed him down a little. since he seemed to be basing a lot of his argument, at least for the day, on the fact that students pull the bulk of their sources from online databases and the like, i wasn't all that convinced. again a little tongue-biting was involved to keep from saying, "well, of course. we're lazy and busy and you let us get away with it. what do you expect? i would never think of trying to pull that for my history work. shall we have a discussion about differing expectations in differing fields?"
anyway, the actual article i wanted to post is this: victor keegan writing about e-readers for books. the picture alone makes it worthwhile to click in.
in the interests of tossing up a few more interesting things midweek, here's an article i haven't had time to read through fully about the new world digital library. which may seem ironic in light of my summary of class-time yesterday, but i'm okay with irony this morning. or perhaps just too tired to avoid it!
i also found roy foster's review of a new history of the 1916 easter rising. the new history looks quite interesting and i've added it to my goodreads list so, y'know, in eight months or a year or so, i'll remember to read it! but this review is also delightful because foster calmly and seriously uses the tardis as a metaphor for the dublin post office.
and a xan brooks article about re-viewing films. i recently tried to re-view a film i've never had much time for, silence of the lambs, and found i didn't have time for it for a variety of excellent reasons and gave up about 40 minutes in.
and, as an a/v treat although i have mostly already discussed this with my friends who i know are doctor who fans, the trailer for the first of the david tennant post-season 4 specials:
it aired in britain on saturday -- so far no sign of it on dvd, although i hope it will only be a matter of months!
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