Television
Digital information is in danger of vanishing into cyberspace Nick Higham, BBC News Breakfast news, BBC 1   -   4th December 2002, BBC News 24   -   2nd December 2002
Newspapers
Digital dark age looms Jack Schofield, The Guardian 9th January 2003		"At the end of the day, we're not storing information, we're storing records. If we convert it to another format, that's not the record. We can't go around telling people which formats to use because that's changing the record. We have to take what people create." [David Ryan]
Domesday project that technology forgot is unlocked David Lister, Media and Culture Editor, The Independent 2nd December 2002		The announcement was made that scientific researchers had found a way to access the huge digital archive of life in the 1980s.
Doomed project to have its day Metro 2nd December 2002		...the unique snapshot of life in the mid-1980s can be explored again. David Greenwell, 24, devoted hours to the project while at school and always wondered what happened to the work he put it. He said: "It was a big thing at the time but we never got to see what happened to everything we did. It would be very interesting to see it all now."
New Domesday, same old story Daily Mirror 3rd December 2002		Intel had the computing market cornered, and Acorn and the BBC bailed out. Information including video clips from BBC and ITV, 200,000 pictures and tens of thousands of maps, hasn't been accessed for 16 years. Project manager Paul Wheatley said: "BBC Doomsday is a classic example of the dangers facing our digital heritage." Wheatley's team found a way of accessing the data by emulating the obsolete system and reading the discs.
Experts unlock BBC's archive of life in the Eighties John Innes, The Scotsman 2nd December 2002		All the information was recorded on two virtually indestructible interactive videodiscs that could be accessed using a special BBC microcomputer system. But the videodiscs far outlived the computer system, without which they proved useless.
Researchers find key to archive of life in the 1980s Yorkshire Post 2nd December 2002		Researchers based at Leeds University and the University of Michigan in the United States have solved the puzzle of how to access the BBC's Domesday project - a huge digital archive of life in the 1980s stored on outdated technology which is inaccessible by today's computers.
University team rescues Domesday project from obsolete discs The Birmingham Post 2nd December 2002		"Our work has demonstrated that techniques like emulation can provide successful routes to preservation, even with incredibly complex resources like BBC Domesday." [Paul Wheatley]
Universities resurrect Domesday project Times Educational Supplement 11th November 2002		Many people thought that the BBC Domesday project of the Eighties - to take a digital slice of UK life and store it on disc - had met its doom, consigned to eternity on redundant videodiscs. Not so. Despite the redundancy of the discs and the BBC computers that read them, attempts are being made to resurrect these resources for modern technology.
Doomed BBC project rescued Emma Wells, Leeds Student 6th December 2002		Wheatley said: "Its wonderful to be involved in a project which is so crucial to the survival of our national heritage. Through research projects like CAMiLEON, Leeds is really taking the lead in the field."
Corporate Amnesia Tessellations No. 44, Autumn 2002		This is an unusual and high profile case, but essentially the same problems face all organisations who have a need or duty to retain information for the long term.
Digital Domesday book lasts 15 years not 1000 Robin McKie and Vanessa Thorpe, The Observer 3rd March 2002		Our digital heritage - only a few decades old - is already endangered
Electronic trail grows cold Mark Tran, The Guardian 7th March 2002		The BBC recently encountered this problem when it found that its £2.5m multimedia Domesday disk could no longer be opened, just 16 years after its creation. Now just think of all the masses of information stored on floppy disks, CD-Roms and DVD drives.
Online
Digital Domesday book unlocked BBC News 2nd December 2002		A rich digital archive of British life in the 1980s has been brought back to life by researchers from the UK and the US ... The research is part of the Camileon project. For the past three years, the team has been looking at methods of digital preservation and testing them with materials like the BBC project.
BBC Domesday book resurrected Nick Farrell, vnunet.com 3rd December 2002		The BBC's Domesday book project has been resurrected from technical death by researchers.
Experts rescue BBC Domesday project knowledge Ananova 2nd December 2002		"But it must be remembered that time is of the essence. We must invest wisely in developing an infrastructure to preserve our digital records before it is too late." [Paul Wheatley]
Digital Domesday Rescued by Emulation Slashdot 2nd December 2002		This is just one early indication of how difficult it will be to maintain our digital heritage.
CAMiLEON: Emulation and BBC Domesday Phil Mellor, The Iconbar 5th December 2002		The BBC Domesday project encapsulates many difficult problems encountered by those working in the field
Brits digitaal archief na jaren weer toegankelijk Web Wereld (NL) 3rd December 2002		Het domesday project was toen technisch "top of the bill".
Miscellaneous
Someone's got to do it... The digital librarian Candida Crewe, The Times 16th November 2002 A subscription to Times Online is required to view the article		If you go back 20 or 30 years, even though there were computers, most interesting information was still available as hard copy. Today most material, even if printed, can be found on computer in a more useful form. We need to take action now or it will all have disappeared in another 20 years.
Pictures from the CAMiLEON meeting Gareth Babb 2nd December 2002
Discussion groups
Following the launch of the Digital Preservation Coalition, March 2002 1086 Domesday Book Outlives 1986 Electronic Rival Slashdot Electronic Domesday 'unreadable' JISC British archaeology discussion list Digital Domesday Book lasts 15 years not 1000 Mediev-l mailing list Digital Domesday Book lasts 15 years not 1000 Book Arts mailing list Preserving digital video vs. film Association of Moving Image Archivists mailing list Doomsday for Digital Domesday - Paper Prevails! Kuro5hin Obsolescence I200 Following CAMiLEON's Domesday publicity event on December 2nd Digital Domesday Rescued by Emulation Slashdot BBC Domesday project comp.sys.acorn.hardware Domesday project comp.sys.acorn.hardware OT: Domesday Pentax-discuss mailing list

IPR and BBC Domesday