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**Alan Browne** · March 12th 10, 08:04 PM posted to rec.photo.equipment.medium-format

On 10-03-11 23:33 , wrote:
Alan Browne wrote:
On 10-03-10 23:59 , Neil Gould wrote:
"Alan wrote:\

One problem with this line of reasoning is that you are describing two
pools of photo takers.

Yes to the "two pools" notion, and the "conservators" being a much
smaller group. (I don't see that as a "problem" however).

Of course you don't, it's your position and you have repeatedly shown
you have no intent on ever bending your position no matter how much
evidence is thrown at you. I highly doubt the "conservators" are much
more than .1% of camera users, if even that. And of those an even
smaller % will be successful at even 100 year archival status of digital
data.

It's like you don't read.

What part of 1 in 1,000,000 is so hard for you to get? And even if the
number is 1 in 10,000,000 there will still be an immense number of
photos that go 500 years.

By your own statement, the digital images that
survive will be managed by those that take extraordinary care of their
data.

I'd characterize it more as "best reasonable effort." Which is orders
of magnitude better than ordinary neglect. And then an even smaller
group making extraordinary efforts.

The problem with digital "best reasonable effort" = failure. With film
that wasn't the case. So with digital ONLY the "extraordinary efforts"

What do you mean by that? Did all film and print images survive? Of
course not. Faded by direct light, attacked by fungus, burned in fires,
diluted by 3rd and more copy generations - only a fraction of film and
print images have survived. Digital images get the same notional
chance, no matter how small that chance is. And that smaller chance is
offset by sheer volume of images produced.

will = success. I recently found some B&W negatives of my parents as
children, they are at least 80 years old and the only effort taken was
they were put in an envelope and put in a drawer, forgotten.

Forgotten in the dark, probably reasonable humidity and heat. At that
they've probably faded more than you think even if they are quite good
looking today.

But that doesn't mean ALL film from ALL time has survived. Digital
images get the same chance. Some will survive much longer, esp. if
prepared to do so. And again, even of those that are prepared, a
fraction will squeak through.

This is not likely to be the same group that will generate the
large number of images you are basing your "1 in 1,000,000 surviving
images" upon. Considering the archival replication processes necessary

Really to illustrate the vast number of photos taken that drive a
likelihood of a portion surviving.

Not a reasonable way to calculate this.

One can't make a certain calculation only a reasonable guesstimate - and
that's all I proposed.

in order to keep a digital image for 500 years, I'd say that your
notion is grossly overestimated, if for no other reason than the cost
of the effort to preserve them.

To be clear: I'm really addressing "survivors" on a statistical basis.
And of course survival favours the prepared.

But you just pulled the statistics out of thin air. You have absolutely
nothing to base your assumptions on.

I never claimed they were anything other than numbers out of thin air.

It was illustrative of the notion that there is an awful lot of photos
being taken today (a billion per day? Somewhere around there, I'd guess).

Let's take 1 billion photos per day as a guessing point.

1 year = 365 billion images.

10 years = 3.65 trillion images.

If out of those 10 years, 1 in 1,000,000 survive, that makes well over
three million images that survive 500 years.

I could be off by 100 times. That still makes over 30,000 images.

All I'm saying is that there will likely be digital images from today
that survive. And of course those that are prepared to do so, are most
likely to do so, even if the chance is quite small.

As to film it requires no less or more chance to survive. Fading is not
the sole criteria.

As to film v. digital, well the photos that are being taken (digital in
the large) have a much larger chance of surviving than those that are
not (film has fallen a lot).

There are many people born in the last 10 - 20 years who have only ever
taken digital images and will never take a film image.

The cheapest method that requires no long term plan is to use archival
CD/DVD (BluRay?) and to store them benignly. There is a very high
probability that a small number of the disks will be well kept. Out of
those, a fraction will retain their data in whole or in part.

You ignore that these disks almost never keep data "In part", they
usually fail 100% or work 100%.

Not so. What fails is the ability of the OS to read them in its
conventional manner. Using data recovery tools, a lot, some or a little
of the data can be salvaged.

It's just big, big, big numbers and the survival of some of the data.
But some small part of a really big number is still a lot.

You totally ignore that this data is MUCH more fragile than prints or
film is. You have to physically destroy them for them to 100% fail.
Given lots of the "billions of images taken" never are even saved to a
hard drive (most are garbage and just are deleted)the chances of a
"deluge of images" being around even 10 years from now is being naive..
In fact MOST people predict the exact opposite, this era will be a
vacuum of images.

No, for several reasons beyond technical.

I mentioned Corbis, and there are other agencies that will be preserving
images for a long time as it is in their commercial interest to do so
and as the cost of storage continues its plunge. So copying data
forward (as we are prone to do every time we buy a new computer) tends
to conserve data and images we don't even look at. That can survive
generations as it is less and less of an effort to do so.

I wouldn't doubt that trusts emerge to preserve images and data for the
long term financed by a conservative trust arrangement.

What happens to the thousands of images on Google over time? Does
Google last 100 years. 200. 300? Who knows. But as the data that
they propagate over media, continuously, inexorably and ever cheaper
forward, they (and others) may play an important role in this. If they
fail would some entity consider the "Google Volume" worth preservation?
Possibly so esp. as "cloud computing" continues to gain traction.

As always, I'm not thinking in terms of "all the images", but those that
are destined by preparation and fate to survive. Some surely will.

I neglected to mention copies. Where there can only be one original of
a film image, there is no limit to the number of original digital
images. Whether I copy a file into 1000 copies from the first one; or
copy 1 to the next 1000 times they will all be identical to the original
down to the bit.

(Caveat, in the later case one should use error verification as random
errors are more likely to occur over successive copies)

One cannot do that with film. Even a contact copy is sligtly less than
the original. Serial copying compounds that.

Multiple copies of digital originals stored at different locations
increase the likelihood of survival.

I should mention the image agencies such as Corbis which amass images
(film and digital) and go to great lengths to preserve those images.
Most of the images they own are very ordinary and some are important.
All are cataloged and preserved. Given the value of image businesses,
these images are destined to survive for a very long time even as the
business changes hands and purpose, technology changes and so on.

Sure and these "professional images" aren't what most people consider
important to save. They want to see pictures of their childhood or their
grandmother as a child etc. Those will mostly disappear in a short
period of time.

True enough, although many of the images in Corbis et al are not
professional, not even commercial. Many are historical in nature and
such will continue to accrete and gain in importance. The question here
is whether Corbis (and others) survive; if they die as a business does
someone else take over the images?

Further, what is trivial today may become important in the future. I
recall one archeologist talking about some ancient finds at an Egyptian
site.

Decoded it was shopping lists, inventories, accounts and plain old gossip.

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