The preservation of sound archives: A computer science based approach to quality control

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This thesis summarizes the author’s work in the last years, which have been spent in the effort of establishing an organic connection in the many aspects involved in the preservation of audio documents. This has been achieved living first hand experiences in archival institutions and in academic research laboratories. The result is a multidisciplinary set of knowledge that is herein presented within the framework of a scientific methodology, the guiding thread of which is a computer science based approach to the quality control in the preservation process. The thesis is organized in five parts. Part one explores the field of preservation with a focus on ethics and philology, reporting the positions of the most authoritative representatives within the international archival community with respect to the cultural dilemma of supporting preservation. In the light of these positions, the author proposes her own methodology for preservation, and details an operational protocol reflecting the theoretical principles. Part two describes the original software that the author has developed with the aim of achieving a greater control over the quality of the preservation process, supporting and automatizing its related activities. Part three reports the results of chemical, mechanical and audio analyses that have been conducted in order to advance the understanding of one of the most common restoration methods for magnetic tapes: thermal treatment. Part four describes the research projects in which the author has collaborated and within the scope of which most of the work presented herein has been carried out. The archives involved have proved an invaluable testbed for the definition of the methodology, allowing the author to perfect the procedures in the light of the problems of real-world archives. Finally, part five moves in the directions of an advanced research field in the preservation area, focused on artistic interactive multimedia installations. Sound is one of the elements that contributes to the creation of the artistic experience, and every aspect of audio preservation is comprised in this field, with the additional problems of dealing with multiple media and with real-time interaction. This parts includes important case studies that the author has taken care of, among which an interactive multimedia installation presented at the Expo 2002. During the author's work in the archives, among the most requested missing tools was an exhaustive list of symptoms and signs of degradation that affecting different types of audio media. The substantial appendix closing this work includes the summary, obtained by crossing several sources and aligning overlapping/contradicting definitions.