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Google to Digitize National Archives Footage

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the everything-else-to-be-destroyed dept.

Anil Kandangath writes "Google today announced their pilot program to digitize the entire video content of the National Archives and make it globally accessible for free on Google Video. The history of the world should be universally accessible and this is definitely a great step towards making sure that our history is not lost, and that everyone has equal and easy access towards such information. Google has provided some sample videos from the National Archives, such as the 1969 moon landing."

11 of 273 comments (clear)

  1. YAY! by ferrellcat · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The history of the world will be archived in the form of crappy, low resolution flash movies!!!

    1. Re:YAY! by kevin_conaway · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Wow.

      Just..wow. What would make you not complain?

      They're giving you something quite nice for free and you still spit on it!

      AND it got modded insightful!

    2. Re:YAY! by Reducer2001 · · Score: 4, Insightful
      We have access to a staggering amount of information - the collected knowledge of the world is at our fingertips. Yay us.

      Yes, yay us. But all this information in the world is useless unless we put it to good use.

      I have a friend who is extremely proud of the mega tool collection he has in his garage. He could do so much with it, like fix cars for extra cash, or maybe build an electronic gizmo with instructions found on the Internet. But he doesn't, so to him those tools are worthless.

      Our collective information is great, now we just need to do something with it!

      --
      When you get to hell -- tell 'em Itchy sent ya!
  2. History of the World? by jonbeckett73 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How the hell is the US national archives the "history of the world"?

    It's exactly what it says it is - the "US National Archives" - i.e. the US version of video recorded history, given whatever slant the news networks of the day were putting on things.

    I'm not anti-American (I have American family), but I WISH the US would remember that they are ONE country in a VERY big world.

    --
    Jonathan Beckett http://www.pluggedout.com
  3. Re:One by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    No no no, you've got it all wrong.

    "One small step for a Google, one giant leap for google kind."

    Get your facts straight before coming to /. like everyone else

  4. National Archives by msbsod · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Why can't the National Archives provide this service? I would like to see public property in the hand of the public.

    How about productions by PBS and NPR? Where are their digital archives?

    1. Re:National Archives by harryk · · Score: 3, Insightful

      For the same reason that not all jails are run by the government, infrastructure. Google may be able to do it cheaper (possibly free to the government?) as opposed to having the National Archives (sic) do it themselves. It costs time, money, and a ton of resources I'd imagine to transfer this type of material. Now, wether or not Google tries to profit from this archive is another story. Based on the content, I don't think it would be possible to profit from it, except perhaps by licensing the database of the archived material to some vendor that wanted to build a search tool .. or something ... but I'm rambling.

      Jails (quite a number of them) can, and usually are, be privately run. Just like in the IT world were services are outsourced. I'm sure Google is charging someone for this, it just better not be the public, atleast not directly.

      just my 2cents.

      --
      think before you write, it'll save me moderator points.
  5. It's a start by Dukeofshadows · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Heck, I'll take low res but free and easily accessible format than nothing and have to comb through the archives by hand. Maybe part of the reason we're experiencing a period of such rapid technological advancement is because we're cutting back on research time via computerization and greater accessibility to data, so I think anything that helps towards that end (starting with the national archives) is a good idea.

    --
    As long as there is a Second Amendment, there will always be a First Amendment.
  6. Re:China too? by Vicsun · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Oh Jesus Christ, stop whining. Is the good Google's doing by digitizing vital information somehow invalidated because they choose to do business with China?

  7. Low Res Yes, But Crappy? by Kozar_The_Malignant · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I hate to break this to you, but for most of the history of "movies" it's all been pretty low-res. I watched those shots form the moon live in 1969, and it didn't look any better than what I just called called up on my extremely hi-res monitor. The main difference being that in 1969 my college student budget extended to a black and white tube set from the Salvation Army Trift Store. We're talking about an analog video squirt from the moon at a time when I was doing college physics and chemistry with a slide rule and calculus with a pencil.

    These images are extremely important, and having them freely available is priceless. Rading about history is not the same as seeing the people involved. Seeing Churchill give a speech is far better than reading it. Seeing Nixon's Checkers speech is priceless.

    --
    Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
  8. Re:Shareholders Or Visionaries? by birge · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The left used to view taxes as a drain on the working man? Rich guys used to use their money to buy libraries instead of stupid hot air balloons? Maybe there is something to the term "good old days" after all. If you tell me they didn't have Microsoft Windows back then, I'm going to cry.