Students from the MA programme Preservation and Presentation of the Moving Image participated in the 2014 World Conference of FIAT/IFTA. They share their impressions in a series of blog reports. Frances Maciver wrote this report.
There was definitely a buzz to the atmosphere of this Friday afternoon keynote speech. While Chris Lacinak of AVPreserve was conscious of how this timeslot can give you an audience with a wondering mind, it seems after a few days of taking in and sharing ideas everyone was primed and excited to listen.
At the beginning of his talk, Lacinak poses a familiar question asked by representatives of funding bodies; ‘If I give you funding, what will be our return on investment?’ There are murmurs punctuated by a few groans of agreement. Many here have been put in this position of being asked to determine value that cannot be put into an excel spreadsheet and there is a sense of vindication. However Lacinak does not end up pandering to his audience.
The Incalculable Cost of Cultural Heritage Loss
He goes on to relate an issue that has been prevalent throughout AV archiving’s history – lack of self-promotion. Archives often have their key performance indicators thrust upon them, and so they often miss the point of what are useful measurements for archives.
Archivists are so often afraid of having their work interfered with, that they won’t risk more interaction with archive outsiders and so are reluctant to advocate. One anonymous archivist once confided that they were afraid that if the true cost of their archiving activities was known they would be shut down.
This is where projects such as 4C are trying to help reframe cost calculations and where AVPreserve’s Cost of Inaction Calculator comes in.
Maintaining the Option
The cost of preserving and migrating sooner costs far less than it is to put it off to a time when the materials have further deteriorated or fallen victim to technological obsolescence. This is essentially what the COI calculator determines – how much money will be saved by taking action on AV collections now rather than later.
The tool has the potential to act as a way to open up communication with those who do not have an archiving background. Therefore if investors are committed to the saving of AV heritage, they can be made to think about how investing more now can save the need for larger investments in the future.
Lacinak stresses that even though pushing through large preservation projects can mean less discerning selection criteria, he constantly reaffirms to the audience the importance of “maintaining the option” as once a piece of AV heritage is beyond repair it is lost forever.
Besides the COI calculator, the company also distributes tongue-in-cheek AV Archiving buttons.
Q&A
The general feedback in the Q&A was very positive. It was conceded that his critiques on archivist culture “hit the nail on the head” and was part of what is holding AV archiving back. It was asked whether or not AVPreserve has had any success stories where the COI calculator has helped archives get funding. While they have had a positive response from archives using this tool, Lacinak said that as it was only released a few months ago they have yet to hear of any concrete funding success stories. Whether this is a tool that will or should be taken up by the wider archiving community remains to be seen, however, as Lacinak points out before exiting the stage; “indecision is a killer”.
More info
- See more photos, presentations and papers over at the FIAT/IFTA website
- Chris Lacinak's full presentation can be found at: http://www.avpreserve.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Lacinak_COI_FIAT_IFTA_2014.pdf