Future-Proofing the News
Preserving the First Draft of History
By (author) Kathleen A. Hansen, Nora Paul
Not available to order
Publication date:
26 January 2017Length of book:
274 pagesPublisher
Rowman & Littlefield PublishersISBN-13: 9781442267145
News coverage is often described as the “first draft of history.” From the publication in 1690 of the first American newspaper, Publick Occurrences, to the latest tweet, news has been disseminated to inform its audience about what is going on in the world. But the preservation of news content has had its technological, legal, and organizational challenges. Over the centuries, as new means of finding, producing, and distributing news were developed, the methods used to ensure future generations’ access changed, and new challenges for news content preservation arose. This book covers the history of news preservation (or lack thereof), the decisions that helped ensure (or doom) its preservation, and the unique preservation issues that each new form of media brought.
All but one copy of Publick Occurrences were destroyed by decree. The wood-pulp based newsprint used for later newspapers crumbled to dust. Early microfilm disintegrates to acid and decades of microfilmed newspapers have already dissolved in their storage drawers. Early radio and television newscasts were rarely captured and when they were, the technological formats for accessing the tapes are long superseded. Sounds and images stored on audio and videotapes fade and become unreadable. The early years of web publication by news organizations were lost by changes in publishing platforms and a false security that everything on the Internet lives forever.
In 50 or 100 years, what will we be able to retrieve from today’s news output? How will we tell the story of this time and place? Will we have better access to news produced in 1816 than news produced in 2016? These are some of the questions Future-Proofing the News aims to answer.
All but one copy of Publick Occurrences were destroyed by decree. The wood-pulp based newsprint used for later newspapers crumbled to dust. Early microfilm disintegrates to acid and decades of microfilmed newspapers have already dissolved in their storage drawers. Early radio and television newscasts were rarely captured and when they were, the technological formats for accessing the tapes are long superseded. Sounds and images stored on audio and videotapes fade and become unreadable. The early years of web publication by news organizations were lost by changes in publishing platforms and a false security that everything on the Internet lives forever.
In 50 or 100 years, what will we be able to retrieve from today’s news output? How will we tell the story of this time and place? Will we have better access to news produced in 1816 than news produced in 2016? These are some of the questions Future-Proofing the News aims to answer.
Journalism and communications professors Hansen and Paul make the case that future generations will want access to today’s news just as we expect access to yesterday’s news. Unfortunately, access isn’t always possible, even in the digital age, due to the factors that they identity and explore. Even when reporting has been preserved, there can be challenges to its usability: limited availability, restricted access, retrieval problems, and format incompatibilities. Hansen and Paul argue that more emphasis must be placed on capturing nascent media and supporting projects that assure older media are transferred to current standards for accessibility. Memory institutions, like museums, universities, and libraries, have largely been the recipients of historical news archives, and their efforts at preservation, restoration, and providing access for historical fact-checking, context, and comprehension are critical for society. Extensively documented with resources, and filled with colorful examples from pre-revolutionary American newspapers to early radio, newsreels, and TV to the cyber world, this is a valuable contribution to the history of journalism.