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Museum of Obsolete Media

Our followers on social media really responded to this year's special edition of The Scout Report, released in honor of National Library Week (April 9-15, 2017). One resource that stood out was the Museum of Obsolete Media, a unique collection of tools and instruments used to record sound, motion, and information over the past two centuries. This online museum, which is frequently updated by curator Jason Curtis, is bound to provoke feelings of fascination, confusion, and even a twinge of nostalgia. Over the past century and a half, the introduction of new technologies has dramatically changed the ways that sound, moving images, and data are recorded. These changes have rendered a number of objects and devices obsolete, from the Ambrotype (a photographic technique used between 1855 and 1865) to Little Marvel Records (a distinctive type of record sold only in Woolworth's Department stores between 1921 and 1922) to the Dragon 32 home computer (sold in Wales between 1982 and 1984). The Museum of Obsolete Media, curated by UK-based librarian Jason Curtis, highlights such materials via four collections: Audio Formats, Video Formats, Data Formats, and Film Formats. Within each collection, visitors may view photographs of dozens of obsolete media items. Each item is accompanied by an image and a brief description of its production, use, and eventual demise. Visitors may also enjoy browsing this collection by a series of Lists, which include Formats by Decade of Obsolescence, 10 Sony Formats that Failed, and 1980s Music Gallery.
Archived Scout Publication URL
Classification
GEM Subject
Language
Date of Scout Publication
May 26th, 2017
Date Of Record Creation
April 6th, 2017 at 1:12pm
Date Of Record Release
April 7th, 2017 at 9:24am
Resource URL Clicks
483

Internal

Cumulative Rating
100
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