Nicholson Baker feels strongly about the importance of libraries as depositories of information. They are to hold for us now and future generations of information-seekers the original, physical texts of newspapers and books regardless of their current or past popularity. What may not be popular today may be tomorrow and if the original is gone, we may be left with an unreadable copy in the form of illegible or deteriorated Microfilm or even an obsolete digital form. Double Fold is a critical and opinionated look on what has been happening and continues today to the vast collection of newspapers and books in libraries. During the 1980s and early 1990s, the movement to preserve books and periodicals for the future led to the destruction of the original copies in order to film them on Microfilm. Regardless of whether the preservation is done because of the deterioration of the texts or to make space in libraries, Baker laments why we cannot have both the original and a copy and presents what we lose in those copies.

While Baker’s efforts to preserve (maybe more appropriate “conserve”) the many newspaper runs at his American Newspaper Repository is laudable, it is also leads to more questions for information professionals as examined by the Society of American Archivists in their response to his book. Richard Cox in “Don’t Fold Up” points out the impossibility of archivists to save everything (or even the copy). The fact is that “libraries and archives have many other competing priorities with limited resources.".

Although Double Fold was written before much of the mass digitization and born digital going on today, I have to believe Baker is still criticizing much of the work being done in libraries and archives. What Baker fears if we lose so many original texts is the opportunity to know or find history for ourselves. ( )

Baker makes some really strong arguments regarding the preservation of original artifacts and the sometimes misguided and wasteful policies by certain leading librarians, but his petty indignant tone and personal attacks on the subjects of his scorn tend to undermine his major points. Of course you might add that someone like Baker who was trying to draw attention to his arguments may have added his incendiary comments on purpose in order to forward his agenda. In the end, Baker demonstrates that he is wiling to put his money where his mouth is and his passion for books and newspapers seems very genuine. ( )

Can it really be this bad? Have to see how all the librarians weigh in but, not to worry, Baker is a novelist so this isn't dry in the least. A real page-turner.

Re the few reviews I looked at here: I don't think Baker is arguing for the preservation of everything. At least, that isn't the conviction I came away with. But, jeez, a full run of the New York Herald Tribune or the New York Times? Shouldn't several full runs be stored lovingly in several, half a dozen, libraries? Surely, Northwestern would be happy to take all the Chicago papers? Boston U the Boston papers and so on?

Was one woman in the US really so influential in the microfilm transition? What has been the impetus in other countries? All especially surprising because is there anyone that doesn't hate microfilm?

I'm wondering what's happening to the newspaper archives in less developed countries. Maybe this warning has stopped them in their tracks. In Southeast Asia, academics, govt officials et al depend on Cornell above all to have the best collection of originals. Has it microfilmed or digitized all this stuff? ( )

http://culturalsnow.blogspot.com/2009...

A few thoughts arising from Nicholson Baker's Double Fold, about the continuing drive in libraries to destroy original copies of books and periodicals, replacing them with microfilm and other media.

It's as much a bureaucratic farce as anything. Daily newspapers, as Baker reminds us, tend to come out in several editions through the day, to catch up with late-breaking news, sports results and so on: standard library policy, however, is to put just one edition on microfilm. The problem with this becomes obvious when considering the Sept 17, 1970 edition of the Chicago Sun-Times. The early edition quoted President Nixon's off-the-cuff remarks about a potential crisis in the Middle East; White House staff complained, and the words were cut from the later edition. Guess which edition was saved to film?

Baker quotes historian Jeffrey Kimball:

"For my new research project, a larger study of 'smoking-gun' documents, Nixon's quoted remarks have a critical bearing, but all I can get hold of now is the microfilm copy of the evening edition of the Sun-Times, which does not quote Nixon's comments; that is, all microfilm copies of this newspaper for this date seem to be of the evening edition."

So, not only does the quotation not exist; but because we can't compare the two editions, all evidence of its removal has also gone, like Trotsky airbrushed from the revolution. The only difference is that this state of affairs seems to be the result of sort-sighted cost-cutting rather than conspiracy.

One of Baker's particular beefs with microfilm is that it doesn't offer a true copy: we lose colour; marginal text is often cut off. Scanned pages saved to disk are often little better, with text recognition software still inferior to the combination of human eye and human brain. The author goes so far as to set up a non-profit organisation to save some back issues of the Chicago Tribune that were destined for disposal:

"Sixty-three thousand dollars, or about fifty dollars a volume, may seem like a lot of money to pay for old news, but it's actually a bargain. To buy the equivalent microfilm run from Bell and Howell would cost about $177,000. We're at a bizarre moment in history, when you can have the real thing for considerably less than it would cost to buy a set of crummy black-and-white snapshots of it which you can't read without the help of a machine."

Baudrillard, of course, wouldn't have found such a state of affairs bizarre. Nor would he have particularly raised an eyebrow at the title of a report by digitisation champion Michael Lesk: "Substituting Images for Books". ( )

This guy is pretty passionate about preservation. I fell for the emotional entreaties, even while my cynical side thought, "We can't keep everything." On the whole, I think he's got some excellent points, and I do tend to agree with him. ( )