So, here are my two cents about digitization.
Is digitization worth it?
Short answer: yes.
The fact that digitization allows for articles and academic materials to be made widely available outside of the research libraries that have traditionally held them would suggest that digitization is a worthy endeavor. However, it is probable that the worth of digitization is relative to the particular fields, domains and user populations in question, as well as the needs and preferences of the individuals working in those fields.
As an anecdotal example, I prefer to read most journal articles in the physical form, but for the sake of convenience and the ability to annotate the text this means that I typically search for digitized versions of articles, print them out, and read them in the comfort of my living room with a bebop record playing. (Some might say that this is a waste of paper, though I would go so far as to say that photocopying articles in the library is equally wasteful—I also rarely discard articles after reading them.) However, if the article I’m reading is particularly weighty (let’s say an intricate statistical analysis of a longitudinal study pertaining to relationship between age, personality and musical practice routines in orchestral musicians), it’s likely that I’d find myself reading in a library anyway… In some cases, the convenience of digitization directly benefits my research habits; in others, it has no impact whatsoever.
Certainly it’s not enough to say that sometimes digitization is worth it, and sometimes it’s not. Instead, we must choose avenues of investigation to support or refute our opinions. The question might be scientifically addressed through the accumulation and analysis of data pertaining to the information retrieval/usage of individuals working in different fields (accounting for types of materials used in digital or analog form). Similarly, one could measure/estimate the circulation and citation history of the items in question: if an item has been widely cited in other literature or if an item has been viewed/checked out many times, it is likely that a large number of people would benefit from the digitization of this item. This is certainly over-simplified, but equally as certainly, an empirical approach to this question could help shed some light on digitization's worth.
Furthermore, in creative fields the dissemination of digitized representations of artifacts fosters creativity. If authorship of creative materials (defined as loosely or stringently as you like) in the modern world is to be seen as a partially or wholly social act, the availability of digitized artifacts would allow for novel selections and combinations of extant symbol systems (e.g. harmonic structures in the domain of the Anglo-American popular music tradition). If Steve Reich hadn’t been exposed to Gamelan drumming, American minimalist music wouldn’t exist as we know it. Undoubtedly, as yet unknown authors and composers are currently being exposed to media that would be entirely unavailable to them without digitization, thus increasing the palate of symbol system usages available to them when they ‘paint their masterpiece.’
Finally, in terms of the hypothetical scenario presented by Lee where a one-of-a-kind rare manuscript consisting of 200 folios would be digitized to the detriment of funds available for traditional collection development, I propose the following (naïve) solution: once an artifact is digitized, access is potentially democratized, so why wouldn’t multiple bodies/organizations whose collections would benefit from the inclusion of the digitized artifact all chip in to pay? Think about it as if you were going out to dinner with a group of good friends to celebrate an occasion: eight people go out to eat dinner at a nice restaurant which costs significantly more than if those eight people all ate their meals separately at home or if one hosted a dinner party at home. They don’t need to go out to dinner, but they want to because of the perceived benefits. Assuming that no one ordered the ahi tuna tartar or the prime rib, no one drank seven sapphire martinis, and everyone had an equally good/memorable time, the bill could justifiably be split equally among all eight parties. The cost incurred to make the occasion more memorable by going out to a nice restaurant would be shared equally-- no one party would have to watch their spending that month any more than any of the other parties (relatively speaking). I know it’s naïve, but it’s simple. It’s all in the name of greater access to information, something from which everyone benefits. If everyone benefits from access, shouldn’t everyone help to pay the bill?
Digitization is expensive, how to sustain it? Is working with private companies a good solution? Any problems that we need to be ware for this approach?
I knew a student who worked for Google on the Google Books project sitting in front of a scanner for several hours per week in order to partially subsidize his living costs. We’ll call him Pip. (Why wouldn't we?) While I’m sure it was nice for Pip to find a job that required such little thought, fostered the development of speed reading (as he claimed) and paid relatively well, it always seemed to me such an odd allocation of manpower to pay Pip to 'sit in front of a machine and turn pages,' as he put it.
I’m not an engineer, and I don’t have even the faintest notion of robotics beyond the very basic works of Alan Turing and Daniel C. Dennett, but I’d be willing to bet dollars to donuts that there are many engineers out there who could design machines capable of digitizing books--- maybe machines that would cost less to create and use than employing humans to carry out digitization tasks. Then again, maybe not, but I'm sure there are qualified parties out there willing to give it a try.
Regarding privatization of the digitization process: the employment of private companies to perform digitization tasks could likely further muddy the legal terrain surrounding the issue. If Company A is contracted by Organization B to digitize an artifact, Company A would likely vie for a cut of the revenue generated by fees derived from consumer access to said digitized work. In other words, the digitizing party could potentially be granted some degree of ownership of the works they digitize. If private companies are to be employed to carry out digitization tasks they would have to exhibit no small amount of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in order to perform the tasks in a mindful, generally beneficial way.
“Risk of a crushing domination by America in the definition of the idea that future generations will have of its world.” Is this a valid concern?
This issue is directly addressed by Racine: “Racine said that his predecessor had taken ‘advantage of the programs announced by Google to bring a problem into the public area that was broadly confined to specialists,’ galvanizing French politicians to take action.” (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/technology/28iht-LIBRARY29.1.8079170.html). Here Racine directly downplayed Jeanneney’s claims, thereby hinting at the hyperbolic, political nature of Jeanneney’s statement, somewhat undercutting its validity.
In any case, it is necessary to respect and preserve the cultural traditions of the world’s diverse societies at the continental, national and local levels. No one society’s cultural artifacts should be deemed as intrinsically more valuable, more worthy of long-term preservation/dissemination than those of any other. Despite this core belief, it is unavoidable that different societies possess different levels of financial ability. Accordingly, the cultural artifacts of certain societies are likely to be digitized at a faster rate than those of other societies; however, digitization of one society’s cultural artifacts does not strip another society of their cultural heritage, nor does it strip their non-digitized artifacts of their worth. The digital market of cultural artifacts might, for a while, be dominated by the artifacts of those societies with more immediate financial ability, but that does not mean that other societies can’t digitize their cultural artifacts later.
Everyone doesn’t show up to a party at the same time, but once they’re there, they don’t leave (at least not if they’re digitized).
I think I will be a good sport by answering your questions under "Another brief notion to consider."
ReplyDeleteWhen I was much younger, every time we learned about history, the first notion that often came into my mind was that "it sucked," due to the fact there was no tv, no video games, or no computers. However, I am sure the people back then did not feel that way, since such technologies were unheard of. Whenever I looked back at the days when we had Blockbuster instead of Netflix, or CD's instead of MP3's, I never recalled having it so rough. It was not until the introduction of those services I realized that simpler solutions were indeed possible, which in turn makes my childhood look like the stone-age in comparison.
As for "[finding] a good recipe" on just about any dish, that will always remain a difficult process. There was a time when people wanted a good recipe, they had to either buy the book or just ask someone. Because of the Internet, anyone can easily publish a recipe, but you can never be certain that it is any good. And if that does not complicate matters enough, whether the recipe actually is good boils down to the opinion of the individual. One person may want a little more of one flavor and a little less of another, while it may be the other way around for someone else.
In conclusion, it is easy to assume that our lives have gotten much better through technological breakthroughs, when overall, it is just different. There are certain aspects that get better, while other aspects get worse. But one thing that will always stay the same is human nature. These technologies have only devised more efficient ways to harmonize with our characteristics, both the good and the bad, and that is hardly an improvement or a detriment to civilization. It is what we do with what we have that truly makes a difference for humanity.