Oh no! Where's the JavaScript?
Your Web browser does not have JavaScript enabled or does not support JavaScript. Please enable JavaScript on your Web browser to properly view this Web site, or upgrade to a Web browser that does support JavaScript.

Some Potentially Worrying News?

Last updated on 3 years ago
S
slider1983Member
Posted 3 years ago

kitsunebi wrote:

because I know that SOMEONE out there will appreciate and benefit from my scans far more than if I simply let the mags rot in my closet.
This is definitely what it's about at the end of the day. Preserving what we have for others even if we think it might not be useful.

I do agree just having a California location isn't a good idea and I think Cifaldi's preservation project would benefit from having regional preservation locations that have access to all the same material. I'm sure not going to bother to take a trip to California if I need to get an archive interview for a game review or article.
KiwiKiwiSuper Admin
Posted 3 years ago
Totally Agree with that statement/sentiment Like
kitsunebikitsunebiAdmin
Posted 3 years ago
Personally, I've never really seen Cifaldi's project as all that useful in regards to magazine preservation (there are other aspects of his project aside from magazines which I am not criticizing). He's creating an archive of physical magazines in a single location in California. Ostensibly, the purpose for this is to preserve them so that the information contained therein will not be lost and can be accessed by...I don't know, the handful of people writing books about game/magazine history who don't mind traveling to California to search through his collection, I suppose. But I'm hard pressed to come up with any kind of argument that makes such a physical archive of mags even remotely as useful as a digital archive, accessible to all.

As a non-book-writing, non-game-researching everyday average person, I view my own efforts in preserving things for the benefit of other everyday average people as a more valuable endeavor than if I were only making them available to writers/researchers/scholars. But obviously, the world disagrees with me, since Cifaldi receives far more support and donations than all of the digital preservation sites like this one combined.

***And please keep in mind -- I DO NOT READ game magazines. So I am not taking the position of "release it digitally to the masses" because I want to personally benefit by gaining access to them myself. I have no interest in ANYTHING in Cifaldi's collection (video games and game magazines are strictly a thing I nostalgically remember from my past, but I neither play games nor read magazines about them anymore). It's just a philosophy I feel strongly about - one I feel strongly enough that I continue to scan magazines I have no personal interest in simply because I know that SOMEONE out there will appreciate and benefit from my scans far more than if I simply let the mags rot in my closet.
S
slider1983Member
Posted 3 years ago
Thanks for clarifying. Was tempted to send my magazines over to Cifaldi but then I remembered the cost to post and receive on his end.
Edited by slider1983 on 19/09/2021, 3 years ago
kitsunebikitsunebiAdmin
Posted 3 years ago
Late to this thread since I haven't logged in for a month, but yeah, Cifaldi isn't collecting scans, his project is all about archiving physical copies. I find it odd how much more support he's received in his archiving efforts in comparison to the support given to digital preservation sites like this one, since only a tiny handful of people will ever have access to his archives, whereas digital copies are available to everyone, but I guess that's what celebrity will buy you.

Jason Scott, however, is in the business of appropriating people's scans without their approval. Any magazine of mine which appears on the Internet Archive was put there against my wishes by Jason Scott, either under his own name or his handle "Sketch the Cow" (I have commented as such on every file of mine I find there). Jason Scott (and also the fellows over at RetroCDN) are the reason I left Retromags, because I was tired of my scans showing up elsewhere, often in altered format or compressed. Luckily, I haven't seen any of the mags I've uploaded exclusively to OGM show up anywhere else yet.
S
slider1983Member
Posted 3 years ago
Thank you for clarifying. I asked on the stream and no one corrected me. Having said that after what Kiwi and others have been through we need to make sure things stay okay like this because we don't want another godane problem. Smile
T
trioptimumNewbie
Posted 3 years ago
Think there are a few crossed wires here. I'm not involved, but I'm familiar with the project.

The VGHF have an extensive collection of print magazines (one of the largest in the world at this point), and they're buying more job lots all the time to fill in the gaps in their research library (which they plan to open to visitors).

What's going on is this: Frank is sending unscanned physical magazines — duplicates from the VGHF's collection — to dedicated scanners (mostly Gaming Alexandria), who are debinding them, scanning them in high quality and uploading them to the Internet Archive.

The VGHF is not collecting digital magazines at present, only originals. Material's flowing out from the VGHF into the Archive, not the reverse.

This just means more rare magazines are getting scanned. It's a good thing.
S
slider1983Member
Posted 3 years ago
Hi, I don't wish to alarm anybody but I was watching a live stream last night and I'm not sure if it has ramifications for us here. Yesterday YouTube channel My Life in Gaming hosted a charity stream raising money for Frank Cifaldi's Video Game History Foundation. They talked a bit about magazine preservation. A lot if not most of Cifaldi's archive material is video game mag material that's scanned or been scanned.

Apparently Cifaldi has some strong ties with Internet Archive.org as Jason there has been donating Cifaldi with magazine scans with Jason getting a lot of credit for the curated scans. Either Cifaldi is aware or unaware that some of that material must be coming from paid godane scavenges. Please bear in mind I DO NOT know for certain that the mags godane stole are being handed to Cifaldi. All I'm aware is that Internet Archive has been handing scanned mags to him, most likely without permission from the uploaders. On the stream I also heard mention of something called 'Alexandria'. They were praising the people there so I'm guessing scans from them are going to Cifaldi as well?

Now I'm aware that Nipledly and a few others have mentioned in the past they have allowed their scans to be posted on Internet Archive but some scanners here such as Kiwi and myself clearly have not and if Jason at IA is happily sending material over to Cifaldi I wonder if the scanner is being credited for the scans. I'm not sure what Kitsunebi's status on this is.

This is reminding me of when Hyperkin put out the Retron 5 because they have the Game Genie licence they went over to GameHacking.org and stole thousands of user created cheat codes without asking and then promoted their cheats as 'curated'. It doesn't mean much until you see your codes being used in a Retron 5 tutorial video by a random YouTuber.

Not sure what Kiwi or other scanners feel about this but considering Video Game History Foundation gets so much praise in the retro scene that praise isn't going to all the people who did the hard work. So is this a cause for concern?
Edited by slider1983 on 05/09/2021, 3 years ago
You can view all discussion threads in this forum.
You cannot start a new discussion thread in this forum.
You cannot reply in this discussion thread.
You cannot start on a poll in this forum.
You cannot upload attachments in this forum.
You cannot download attachments in this forum.