I’ve been going through my digital “archive” of converted and born-digital images and I dug up a bunch to add into my myriad of photo sets. It wasn’t exactly a warm fuzzy walk down memory lane, though. A while back I had dozens of film negatives scanned onto photo CDs. Today, when I tried to open them I was stuck with a proprietary format that is very-nearly unsupported. It was only a few years ago I had them scanned and the format is already obsolete. This is a worrisome topic for me as I consider all the millions of people happily snapping away with their digital cameras not knowing the difficulties they face in the coming years in terms of migrating, converting, and backing up their treasured photos. Even with a photography and archives background, I still struggle with managing all of my digital assets. Without better support for the consumer, I fear we may experience a cultural dark ages.

Film has an inherent backup in that in order to enjoy the images you have to create prints. Often the prints survive while the negatives become damaged or misplaced. But at least a copy survives. With digital images, we tend to transfer them onto our computers (or even leave them on memory cards) with the thought that we’ll get around to printing them later. Inevitably, though, we forget. What happens when our computer crashes or our memory card becomes corrupted? Similar arguments could be made about the fragility of film and there are far more benefits to digital than not, but the concern for preserving our vernacular heritage is still very real.

We need a non-proprietary application that: 1) embeds metadata that is universally readable; 2) stores a copy of the original file and derivatives; 3) periodically checks for conversion/migration compatibility; and 4) offers off-site storage. On top of that, we need the practical, every day tools for organizing, accessing, and sharing photos. Professionals have access to resources that satisfy all of these needs but they are expensive and complex. Consumers (read: “you and me”) need something much simpler but just as robust in functionality. What’s most important, though, is we need a product that has our best interests in mind and doesn’t force us into proprietary formats, file structures, and complicated learning curves. We need a product that is going to sustain and preserve our memories for the long-term.