After reading The Book History of Archival Record by Katherine Ode and Roger Osborne, I can safely say that digital archives are a double edge sword. It is so powerful because it has the ability to archive anything very easy, but it can also be taken away easily and have their original meaning/history erased. They go in to explain that representing one digital record for every copy of a book is simply not enough and dangerous for our history. “The danger also exists that a single digitized record will be considered sufficient to represent all versions of a work (regardless of manifestation and physical characteristics, such as marginalia and other page markings). (233)
We must also understand that there are benefits to the digital archive in which time is cut short, and we are able to process more information faster into the archive. It saves everyone time, money and hassle, but it also erases the physical history of what it is. The physical aspects are beyond crucial as they teach us a huge piece of history from the book’s life. Of course, you can add descriptions of its physical aspects on the digital archive document, but it’s not the same as having it in your hands to inspect and analyze correctly. The history being erased is now another worry that I have about digital archives because my only worry about them before was the fact that you need a license to access most digital media. These digital licenses are not ownership licenses which allow for companies to pull away any digital media whenever they want which is terrifying. While I do believe that digital archives can serve us great purpose; I do believe that we should find ways to preserve the physical history of whatever book is being talked about. Representing one piece of work would essentially silence and erase many voices about how they treated their copy of the book. This is something that ultimately worries me but makes me wonder how we will tackle it.
While I am worried about how digital archives will act in the future, I am very much open to the idea of how they can still benefit us as a society in any way that wouldn’t hurt our history.
HI Mario! It seems like you are making the argument that we should have both physical and digital archives (which I completely agree with, as it seems like the best solution). I will say that while physical archives aren’t as susceptible to things such as a possible cyberattack/hacker, they are still things that can be destroyed relatively easily. I always think of the Library of Alexandria; it’ a prime example of us losing material in a physical archive through fire. I believe a lot of these were the only copies in the world, and thus lost forever. I like to think of the physical as the primary and digital as secondary—like a backup that also makes the object more accessible even if it is digital. For things that are originally digital, however, I am not sure what to do—maybe have another back-up like a thumb drive.