My worry is that historical recordings and publications are more and more going to closed collections with no public access while local libraries and collections are culling the less used items on their shelves and herding them to the dumpster.
-
Get involved.
We want your input!
Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.
After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.
After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/
Thanks in advance and have fun!
RadioDiscussions Administrators
Aaron Mintz
- Thread starter TheFonz
- Start date
My worry is that historical recordings and publications are more and more going to closed collections with no public access while local libraries and collections are culling the less used items on their shelves and herding them to the dumpster.
Which was my thinking (but I didn't say it) in the post before that one.
Only for on-campus listening. Open to researchers with no materials to be borrowed or reproduced:
https://atom.emerson.edu/index.php/a...?sf_culture=en
Which means hundreds of thousands of hours of rare radio and TV are now out of circulation.
Aaron told me and everyone he was in contact with that he was donating the collection to Emerson. I doubt seriously that Emerson will give anybody who would give those pieces a good home any heads-up when they cull.
It's been happening for 20 years that I'm aware of at libraries---not getting enough activity---out the door and to a landfill.
Sure, the things Aaron traded with us for are in our hands---and if we're active traders, some of it's getting passed on----but Aaron's list had thousands of items. I doubt he traded it all----meaning that a bunch of the stuff Emerson has is one-of-one.
You know there is just so many airchecks mr. mintz collection alone so thats why i posted those links because it is frustrating that the general public cant access them online.
Also why is there no need for the site be up if you have all these people just on radiodiscussions website alone that are interested in accessing them but cant because the links do not work and content has been removed? Just because they were donated to a university doesnt mean people in other parts of the country can easily access them. Think before you just respond to my posts like that. Because i put time into outlining stuff and what does and doesnt work for a reason.
When I started what became americanradiohistory.com it was a simple first step. I was often asked, professionally and among radio friends, about station owners, formats and such from the past. I had a few Broadcasting Yearbook issues and put them online. They got a few hundred views a week, as they had not been found by search engines and I did not have a clue about SEO.
But I got requests for more. I added more yearbooks. Then Broadcasting Magazine, and the page views increased. I got rather frequent emails saying, "they used to have that magazine at the library here, but they told me they had discarded it due to lack of interest."
As that happened nationally, my page views increased. I've had days of 30,000 to 60,000 page views, and average a half-million a month. That must mean that there are a lot of people who want the information and no longer have access to it.
I have had a number of offers from museums and universities to form a partnership. I'd only do it were the open access and free downloading to continue. For the moment, we have site curators and I have a succession plan.
Occasionally those items go to "friends of the library" groups that raise money selling on eBay. But usually it's the dumpster.
Last edited:
kidrauhl: It's important to understand that Aaron's lists were just that---lists. There were no links to material that you could read, listen to or watch. It was just "this is what I have", intended to facilitate trades with other collectors. He no longer has the material and is no longer trading. There is no point in his continuing to bear the expense for the pages to remain active.
Delving back into Emerson's page on the subject, they have done some cataloging and listing in their own format, so you can, in fact, see a lot of what Aaron had. What's alarming is that (and I was worried this might be the case), so far the University is focusing on Aaron's old-time radio and history programs and not on contemporary 20th century pop music radio. Here's the link. Use the box on the left side of the page to navigate: https://atom.emerson.edu/index.php/mintz-aaron-2
Last edited:
And, as you'll see by my response to kidrauhl, there's reason to fear that for the airchecks in Aaron's collection.
I had a discussion about this with an audio archive that I won't name. They told me very directly when someone donates a collection, they need to provide funding (or a source for funding) for all the time and effort required to convert the audio to digital. I'm talking about original masters, not airchecks. Airchecks have a lower level of value.
Libraries are no longer what I consider as reliable repositories of historical content. But, I have to be sympathetic to the economic pressures they face trying to justify the storage costs of materials that have a limited local audience.
AmericanRadioHistory.com is doing a great job filling the vacuum. We appreciate you.
AmericanRadioHistory.com is doing a great job filling the vacuum. We appreciate you.
Head-crashes on three of the four drives in your array?? How long had they been in service?
Thats kind of stupid that they make the person donating the material pay to have them converted to digital because arent these libraries getting tax dollars from the state? Come on libraries you gotta do better than that.
I'm not talking about public libraries.
Understandable, but sad.
I reached out to Emerson and got a very nice reply. Apparently Aaron divided his collection and what is online at the Emerson link I posted above is all they got from him. The person who responded says Aaron was in talks with several other organizations and educational institutions, so it's possible that the airchecks are someplace that appreciates them and will give them the proper care.
Further update: Aaron's aircheck collection now resides with The Radio Preservation Task Force archive, a project of the Library of Congress. So it is in good hands, and unlikely to end up in a landfill.
- Status