Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Keeping data alive

This image was almost lost.

So was this.
You can read about NASA archivist Nancy Evans battle to save these images and more, in LAT's NASA's early lunar images, in a new light.

I am not surprised she applied for funding through the appropriate NASA channels each year to try to save the imagery (which resided on perishable magnetic tape), and was denied each time. Data preservation gets no respect at NASA (and most places).

She would probably have had better luck if she applied to the Library of Congress, which does fund data preservation.

If you have 10 minutes to kill, you may want to watch the video, Barriers to Innovation and Inclusion.

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