20 Jan
2012
20 Jan
'12
7:21 p.m.
On Fri, Jan 20, 2012 at 1:45 PM, Al Kossow <aek at bitsavers.org> wrote:
We had around 65,000 visitors last year. With that many members of the
general public
in an exhibit, theft and vandalism becomes a real concern. Along with that,
many people
feeling the need to touch artifacts, climb on platforms, and try to do
things like open
equipment drawers.
Hopefully, that explains the current thinking of the curatorial staff of the
museum.
I'm not saying that the strict preservationist approach is necessarily
a bad thing, especially where you've got lots of visitors.
Additionally, I do feel that the CHM's software and documentation
preservation and sharing work is IMMENSELY beneficial to everyone. I
was merely pointing out that the tensions between a preservation-first
approach and an operations-oriented approach exist in many contexts.
Mike