Last Friday we talked a bit about video game preservation in regards to the 3DS and Wii U eShop's closing (to new purchases), and where that leaves people who came late to the consoles/games that are no longer actively distributed. This is obviously not a video game only problem as the same could be said for any form of media from written music, previously performed music, movies, TV shows (including streaming), licensed toys (specifically Super Mario LEGO sets), and even content for apps that are no longer in existence. What inspired me to write this snippet of an article was a recent search for a book after having watched Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.
Without going too much into spoilers (the movie is only 63 days old), the Red Wizards of Thay feature in the movie and both Conklederp and The Kid asked me about this group and region as they both have played D&D (pen and paper, and video games) and were not familiar with them. While I have never played a game (either p&p or vg) that heavily featured them, I have read about them being referenced in books and modules. I knew that they were an arcanecratic (as their historical system of government revolved around magic and typically those who were the most powerful magic users were its leaders, and they had a lot to do with liches) government, that they were typically depicted as being evil and that the wizards, more often than not, wore red robes. In a quest, I wrote that our group played, I did have the initial antagonist (or at least who the PCs perceived to be the antagonist until the BBEG, who was entirely unconnected, was revealed in the closing act) formally be a Red Wizard of Thay until a magical mishap occurred, but that was all character backstory for myself that was never revealed to the PCs.
While thinking about Thay, I realized that I had never actually read a book or played a game that took place in Thay or heavily featured a Red Wizard of Thay. So I looked up The Forgotten Realms Fandom page to find out which books/modules featured the Red Wizards. That was how I found out about "Red Magic," written by Jean Rabe in 1991, being the earliest chronological book to feature the Red Wizards. So I looked up the book on my Library's webpage, both in physical and digital format, and it was not available. So my next step was to check Amazon's Kindle store, and again, the book was not available in Kindle format, but I could buy a used copy varying between $6.07 - $37.78. Even Google Books tells me that there is no known eBook version of this particular book, which does not make as much sense to me because books 1, 2, and 4 (as well as others) in The Harpers Series are available, but not the specific one I am looking for. Just my luck, I know.
Now, if I am going to buy a used book, I would rather visit one of the likely hundreds of bookstores in the PDX metro area and I have one specific bookstore in mind, but a lot of these bookstores do not have searchable inventories, so the hunt for a physical copy of "Red Magic" will take time and in the end, however much I want to pay for the book depending on its condition. Or I could buy the one copy from Powell's which is located in Cedar Hills for $4.95 (not including s/h).
Again, this brings up the conversation of preservation. I am not a person who is looking to buy a copy of "Red Magic" to build out my collection of 2nd Edition AD&D novels, but just a person who wants to read the story in this book. I have been able to request that my local library "order" books, but this one is not one that I can do that with, likely because there is not an eBook version of "Red Magic." One of the conclusions reached by this lack of media preservation (especially media that has not yet entered the public domain, which varies depending on the country you are in, usually 50-75 years after the death of the author) is left to third party entities such as the Video Game History Foundation and the Internet Archive. Although both of these resources are limited by the formats allowed to the media, where the VGHF might have a harder time preserving digital-only releases when digital storefronts are no longer in service, and digital libraries if no digital copies exist apart from scanned images of the book to a PDF file. In both cases, there could be the risk of unauthorized reproduction of copyrighted material, which again brings us back to the public domain.
This is where my thought process on this topic ended as I did not go out to make a larger statement about media preservation or strive to solve the conundrum of what to do when a form/type of media becomes no longer available and the question of what happens to that media in the future. All I have are more questions, some of which I brought up in Monday's article. Just more things to think about as I decide if I want to add all 18 books from The Harpers Series to my reading list, and how many of those books already cross-pollinate with series that I am already reading, all before I rerererereplay Baldur's Gate (again).
~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
No comments:
Post a Comment