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Yes, most developers did save a copy but there often there was little thought to proper archive storage. This means the media degraded in storage, lost during m
by sitharus 8y ago
Yes, most developers did save a copy but there often there was little thought to proper archive storage. This means the media degraded in storage, lost during moves or thrown out accidentally. For an example see this story about Prince of Persia https://www.wired.com/2012/04/prince-of-persia-source-code/ https://www.wired.com/2012/04/prince-of-persia-source-code/, I've seen others over the years but don't have links handy.
- pimmen 8y agoNot thinking of proper archiving proceedures is also exactly what happened with movies (and TV, the Dr. Who missing season was an ebarassing case of this). I know that studios exists to make money, and that they do that by controlling the distribution of the media, but it’s very sad when parts of our culture can get lost like this even though it’s preventable.
- the_seraphim 8y agoI remember when a lost episode of Dad's army was found on a cassette because some guy happened to record it from the radio and never lost it.
- admax88q 8y agoIf they didn't make it illegal for home viewers to make their own copies then its possible that we wouldn't have to rely on studios doing proper archiving. As it stands now most preservation projects start looking for copies of work once the copyright has expired, which is long enough for many things to already be lost, unless copies are found from so called "criminals" who made their own archives in violation of copyright law.
- im3w1l 8y agoSweden has a law that any published book has to be archived in a national archive. Something similar could be setup for other media.
- gray_-_wolf 8y agoCould work 20 years ago, but now? Games (software in general) is usually patched at insane rates (which version to keep? All of them?) and most games don't work without internet anymore (and you can hardly mandate archiving or never-released-server-software). Sadly, I don't think there is a reasonable way to do this...
- nitrogen 8y agoand you can hardly mandate archiving or never-released-server-software Why not? A hypothetical preservation law could require the submission of all servers, assets, and instructions required to make the game useful. Doesn't matter which version as long as the submitted package is usable as a whole.
- vatueil 8y agoThe Library of Congress similarly receives a copy of every book published in the United States, though they don't permanently keep a copy of every book. Many other countries do the same: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_deposit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_deposit
- eridius 8y agoI thought Dr. Who's missing episodes wasn't because they didn't think of proper archiving and it degraded, but because they literally overwrote the tapes with other stuff.
- pavel_lishin 8y agoThat definitely falls under "improper archiving procedures", and is tremendously more embarassing than merely having the medium degrade.
- eridius 8y agoYou say "improper archiving procedures", I say they clearly weren't even trying to archive it.
- Rebelgecko 8y agoThere's also cases like the Star Wars Holiday Special, where the creator presumably has it archived but doesn't want anyone to see it again. I believe all of the available copies are from people who happened to record it, which led other people to splice together fan edits in an attempt to create the highest quality version.
- yongjik 8y agoNASA has lost high-resolution footage of Apollo 11 landing. I think nobody can top that! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11_missing_tapes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11_missing_tapes