[78-L] V-DISC Requests.

[Taylor Bowie]

It's very late at night,  and my patience has worn so thin that you can see 
through it.

My reply to the following "thoughts" follow them.



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Steven C. Barr" <stevenc at interlinks.net>
To: "78-L Mail List" <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>
Sent: Friday, June 26, 2009 8:48 PM
Subject: Re: [78-L] V-DISC Requests.



> IIRC, a V-Disc discography was complied and publised by Richard
> Sears (?!) some time ago! Like virtually ALL discograhies, it was
> actually a manually-typed-out version of what COULD/SHOULD
> have been a digital database file!!
>
> We lost VAST amounts of 78-related information in the WWII
> "paper drives" that saw irreplaceable documents pulped to allow
> the printing of countless "official manuals" which explained in
> excrutiating detail whether a Lt. Col. (new battlefield promotion!)
> would/could/should "out-rank" a WWI-promoted Major! We
> have ALSO "lost" huge amounts of 78-related discographic data
> which was only "privately-published" by people like the recently-
> late Arthur Badrock...meaning it exists currently in the form of
> pamphlets which will most likely be discarded in the process of
> "closing out estates"...?!?!
>
> Remember that a discographic work, once digitized, becomes
> searchable and sortable! Twenty years ago, my then-employer
> offered an interest-free loan to purchase a "home computer."
> I borrowed/spent almost $2,500.00 to acquire an 80286-based
> machine; my employer gave me dBASE III+, which I used to
> "digitize" various discographic compilations, like the Plaza
> matrix listing (from RR) and RR's "Perfect" listing! Once I
> discovered how easy it was to sort these data files on ANY
> field (back then this took about one full minute!!), I realized
> all 16,000 3x5 cards had been WASTED effort!!
>
> ...stevenc


Yeah,  right...how stupid of everyone back in the 60s 70s and 80s who didn't 
put everything in a digital form...what were they thinking?

Oh...let's see...maybe they didn't have a computer then...and they were 
thinking that the information they were recording and preserving was worth 
putting into a form (print) which had been working pretty well for about 500 
or so years,  so that it might be shared with others.

Books can be discarded,  yes, but computer files can be corrupted and 
deleted as well.   There is no sure-fire way to assure that information will 
be preserved,  sad to say.

Just a thought...of course I'm not an Expert.  Oh,  and by the way,  the 
Sears V-Disc discography came out in 1980,  "IIRC" (and I do RC).  So even 
that wonderful,  interest-free 20-year old computer wouldn't have been of 
much use then,  would it?


Taylor