Audio recordings of a decade ago or half a century ago are terribly hard to find. Most of them are present in mediums which are hard to avail for a common person. Even if the medium to run the recording is furnished, it is hard to reach the recording itself. Library of Congress intends to change that with its National Recording Preservation Plan.
Most of the early audio recordings in the country are currently stored either in private collections of different people or in libraries and repositories scattered all around the nation. So when a researcher or a common user wishes to access any of these, he/she has to undergo a lot of hassle, sometimes resulting in naught.
The new project by Library of Congress aims at resolving this problem. For now, the Library hopes to build up a national directory of sound recordings, which will be accessible publicly. This, we are told, will serve as an ‘authoritative discography’ and will furnish not only the location and nature of a given recording, but also details about its production.
This would essentially make the task of discovering such recordings easier for researchers and common users alike. Moreover, the Library of Congress also hopes that in the coming days, it may eventually strike licensing agreements with different persons or entities storing this recordings, so that it is allowed to stream these recordings online.
While the later part of the project remains long in the coming, once it happens, it would make the discovery of these recordings and access to them a lot easier.
Source: Library of Congress
Courtesy: Engadget
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