Description: Do you still work with 3.5-inch diskettes? How about 5.25-inch floppy disks and Zip disks? I do. As an electronic records archivist at the Smithsonian Institution Archives, I spend most of my time working with digital information to help ensure it will be accessible in 5, 25, or even 100 years from now. Born-digital materials arrive at the archives in a variety of ways (CDs,
Description: So you know those thousand words a picture is worth? It’s true! Though my idea of what those thousand words should be might differ from yours and that’s why we’re going to talk about descriptive metadata, controlled vocabularies, and levels of access. Boy howdy, sounds like a wild ride, eh? When I was younger and infinitely more creative with how I spent my time I used to
Description: The DMZ ecology project reveals the Smithsonian’s commitment to ecological research programs as well as the complexity and contingency of an international collaboration.
Description: Nearly two years ago, I first heard of a course on the conservation of Japanese paper co-organized by ICCROM, the cultural heritage arm of UNESCO, and the Tokyo National Research Institute for Cultural Properties (also known in Japanese as “Tobunken”). Over three weeks, the course offered a first-hand look at the traditional Japanese conservation techniques, materials, and
Description: Since our last post, we have moved back to working on site in our new, hybrid normal. See how our proposals for new workflows are turning out!
Description: Today is the first day of winter. Not ready for the cold weather? It could always be worse. Ornithologist (and future tropical biologist) Neal Griffith Smith once wrote in his journal:"Still pensil [sic]. Well, I've got time and temperature to write. Just sharpened the pensil with a snow knife. We are parked smack in the middle of Southampton [Island] in a bloody windstorm. It