Date   : Thu, 04 Jan 2001 10:41:11 +0000
From   : Paul Wheatley <p.r.wheatley@...>
Subject: Re: VFS: (BBC Video Disk) : Doomsday Project

Ben Newsam wrote:
> >Transfering the data to CD-ROM would probably be tricky due to the actual
> >volume. There are approximately 200000 analogue pictures on the 2 discs as
> >well as around 600 megs of digital data. Depending on what rez you digitise
> >them at, that could be an awful lot of data.
> 
> I can understand that it would require quite a few CDs. My own interest
> in it is in making the data available again, rather than preserving the
> data or curating a working system. For the former purpose, there would
> be no harm in compressing picture data using JPG format or similar,
> which of course would be unacceptable for preserving "pure" data. What
> was the capacity of 12" video disks? And did the Doomsday (Domesday?)
> Project completely fill both sides of both disks?

I think I've pretty much answered this in another mail, but suffice to say
the total amount of data is a lot. There are of course the *major* copyright
problems I've also mentioned elsewhere. If anyone tries to distribute it
Ordanance Survey will almost undoubtedly jump on them. And without the maps
most of the Domesday stuff doesn't make much sense.

> 
> >Finally, the copyright issues are a major problem, particularly the OS maps
> >which OS is unlikely to want accessable in a modern computing environment
> >even if they are in bitmap form and 15 years old. So for the moment our aim
> >is to preserve but not to allow access, until if/when we can sort out the
> >IPR.
> 
> That's a shame.
> 
> Do the BBC not own all rights to the disks, then?

No.

> If not, then who does?

Photo sets - various photographers commisioned by Acorn/BBC
Text data - thousands of school children - many of which didn't sign off
there copyright to the BBC as the copyright forms were sent out to schools
after the actually left school!

> Or is it all horribly complicated?

Yes.

> I would have thought that they (in
> the shape of BBC Enterprises) would be happy to see a reissue, as they
> would probably sell more in a new form than they would have of the
> original.

Unfortunately its not as simple as that... I imagine if people were to lobby
the history department of the BBC, that might help tho.

Paul