Shakespeare Electronic Conference, Vol. 4, No. 891. Friday, 3 December 1993.
From: Steve Urkowitz <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Thursday, 02 Dec 93 20:11:03 EST
Subject: 4.0865 Re: Electronic Scholarship and Texts
Comment: Re: SHK 4.0865 Re: Electronic Scholarship and Texts
Acidic paper and "perfect" paperback bindings have an electronic analog in the
de-laminating or other ghastly deteriorations of magnetic tape, such as will so
on happen to my first-purchased copy of Zeffirelli's ROMEO AND JULIET video
casssette. A scary article about the ephemerality of video "documents" appears
in last Sunday's New York TIMES Business section. Seems like life in a
temperate climate for magnetic tape is nasty, brutish and short. Maybe
fifteen years? But I assume that by late next week we will be able to purchase
a peripheral that can write our videos onto CDs or something with the
half-life of a cunieform tablet. Life is long and art whips into oblivion?
Having just cut up the stage floor of our Twelfth Night production to build
benches, I'm very aware of how a play has to be savored like a sunset.
Steve Urkowitz, SURCC@CUNYVM
