[ih] Re: internet-history Digest, Vol 2, Issue 4

[Ted Faber]

On Fri, Sep 24, 2004 at 02:07:27PM -0700, Aaron Falk wrote:
> 
> On Sep 24, 2004, at 10:27 AM, Ted Faber wrote:
> 
> >Seriously, there are a variety of places for researchers and engineers
> >from all over to get their ideas published these days.  From white
> >papers to traditional conferences and workshops to google-archived web
> >pages, it's easier than ever to get an idea on the public record.
> >
> 
> Ah, but published != archived.  Where will the public record of these 
> ideas be 30 years from now?

Publication alone does not create archives, but wider publishing and
better indexing has to make an archivist's job easier.  (Please make
sure one reads both sides of that "and" before sending me mail about how
more information is not necessarily easier to archive.)  If it's easier
to do and the benefits are more accesiible to others, more people will do it. 
As evidence consider these:
http://epguides.com/DukesofHazzard/guide.shtml
http://www.tvtome.com/tvtome/servlet/EpisodeGuideSummary/showid-684/The_Dukes_of_Hazzard/
http://www.dukefarm.com/episode1.html
I also suspect that no one concerned with this topic hypothesized such
an archive would be created or maintained.  It's fairly easy to make the
archives and make them acccessible, so they happen.

Existing archives also become more accesible:
http://www.ced.berkeley.edu/cedarchives/ 

Lloyd expressed a concern that academics would take all the credit for
network ideas, presumably because academics would document their work more
often and also manage the archives.  I'm saying that there are more
opportunities to make your work known these days and that there are more
archivists these days (tecnnology's making it easier).  I hypothesise
that that combination implies there is more chance that non-academic
work will make it into a[n] historical record/archive/greatest hits
collection.  Immortality is easier than you thought.

"If you would not be forgotten,
 As soon as you are dead and rotten,
 Either write things worthy reading,
 Or do things worth the writing."
           -- Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanac, May 1738


-- 
Ted Faber
http://www.isi.edu/~faber           PGP: http://www.isi.edu/~faber/pubkeys.asc
Unexpected attachment on this mail? See http://www.isi.edu/~faber/FAQ.html#SIG 
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