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On 9/8/2014 11:35 AM, Tom Fine wrote: > Hi Bert: > > I'm not saying ARSC "should step in and solve" any "issues." What I > am saying is that we could help spread tips and good practices > suggestions for amateurs. I'm sure there are plenty of weighty tomes > hidden away on dense websites somewhere, but this stuff probably > isn't getting read much. I'm suggesting ARSC can take a user-friendly > approach, and make stuff accessible via modern means (YouTube, social > media, informal "meet-ups", etc). The over-riding ethos should be > KISS (keep it simple, stupid). > > If this is some sort of "controversial notion" vis-a-vis ARSC > official business, then OK perhaps some of us individual ARSC members > who care about the issue can self-organize and do some of this on our > own. > > By the way, although there may well be plenty of outreach and > information, I get calls all the time about archives of bad-recorded > lossy digital audio. "What can we do about it?" "They recorded this > at 64kbps MP3 and it's full of artifacts and noise," etc. Or, "we had > a guy with a cassette machine who loaded this into the computer at > 64kbps WMA, and now we'd like to do some signal-processing on it." > So, the problem is still very real. The latest bad trend is using > lossy low-quality cellphone video as a collection device (audio-wise, > this is usually worse than an early-era digital audio recorder at > 64kbps MP3). The worst thing is, parameters can be tweaked in many > cellphones, and videos can be extracted native-resolution, they don't > have to be uploaded super-lossy and then deleted. It's just a matter > of relatively simple training for the non-technical. Those of us > comfortable with technical gear and gadgets always underestimate how > difficult this stuff is for a normal civilian to properly use. A couple of years ago, I wrote an article for Recording magazine that attempted to give some user-friendly suggestions for oral history recording. The folks at Airshow Mastering have reprinted the article here (with the magazine's permission): http://www.airshowmastering.com/sandbox/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/ATimeToGive_REC_1212.pdf It's part of a larger set of information that Airshow has posted: http://www.airshowmastering.com/oral-history-capture-the-best-interview/ They include links to the Oral History Association and ARSC websites. Peace, Paul