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authorstalker · 3 months ago

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My May, June, July, & August Reads

Prairie, Dresses, Art, Other, Danielle Dutton - I put this on hold because 1) I love Dutton's novel, Margaret the First, and 2) the cover art is so different and so great. I really enjoyed the experience of reading PDAO; it made me feel smart, like I was back in school. That said, I also had to skim some of the "Art" section because it went over my head. I was most engrossed by the short stories in "Prairie" and the collection of literary dress quotes in "Dresses." In a fun coincidence, I had just started reading Lolly Willowes, and one of the dress quotes is pulled from that novel. Keep doing you, Danielle Dutton—I love your weird brain.

Lolly Willowes: or, The Loving Huntsman, Sylvia Townsend Warner - Another book I picked up because 1) I enjoyed a different novel by the author (in this case, Warner's Black Death nun book, The Corner That Held Them) and 2) the cover art called to me (in this case, witches flying on brooms across a hideous yellow background). Lolly Willowes is a wild ride—it was the first-ever book selected by the Book of the Month Club!—and yes, there are witches.

Beautyland, Marie-Helene Bertino - It took me longer than expected to get invested in this, for which I blame my tragic attention span, but I was hooked as soon as the protagonist started her high school years. A beautiful character, the most beautiful writing, and of course I cried buckets.

The Alternatives, Caoilinn Hughes - A novel about four sisters! Set in Ireland! It's funny and cynical! Unfortunately it lost my interest for a hot second 3/4 of the way through, but the insane ending saved the day.

Any Person Is the Only Self: Essays, Elisa Gabbert - An all-time favorite. If reading is central to your identity, you must get this book.

Grief Is for People, Sloane Crosley - I will think about the Grand Central Station scene forever. Yes, this book is very sad, but also there's a lot of publishing industry gossip. After you read it, I highly recommend listening to her interview on the Longform podcast.

Tom Lake, Ann Patchett - Some people, including people I know, did not enjoy this novel, and I simply can't relate. I loved every page, every character, every relationship, the Michigan setting, learning about the play Our Town and sewing and harvesting cherries. I loved it so much that I'm going to see Our Town on Broadway next month; Katie Holmes is playing Mrs. Webb and my first thought was, "Wow.....Joey Potter aged out of playing Emily, we are all so old." Thank you, Ann Patchett!

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kaiser1ns · 2 months ago

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you can’t stop the bridge between our worlds from coming, but it would be fun to watch you try! for this dimension the plan has six steps and will be divided into six days featuring some interesting indivuduals … time is nothing but a construct, an easy thing to manipulate!

𝗱𝗲𝗺𝗼𝗻!𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗼 𝘆𝗮𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗼 𝘅 𝗳𝗲𝗺!𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿

DEVIL ALWAYS TEMPTINGㄑdoes it matter that the boy you appeared with at the party to make your ex jealous, is actually a demon hungry for deals and human souls. that sounds fun, right?

𝘃𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗶𝗿𝗲!𝘁𝗮𝗸𝗶𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶 𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗸𝗮 𝘅 𝗳𝗲𝗺!𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿

COME OVER AND BITE MEㄑfor some reason your boyfriend didn't like to go out, nor did you have pictures together. it was strange, maybe it was because you started dating three months ago. but was this really the case?

𝗺𝘂𝗺𝗺𝘆!𝘁𝗼𝗴𝗮𝗺𝗲 𝗷𝗼 𝘅 𝗳𝗲𝗺!𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿

A NIGHT AT THE MUSEUMㄑyour university had an organized trip to the history museum. from dinosaurs to the prehistoric era and passing ancient sarcophagi with mummies. everything was going great until you were left alone in the building and one of the sarcophagi was opened, revealing an ancient secret.

𝗴𝗵𝗼𝘀𝘁!𝘂𝗺𝗲𝗺𝗶𝘆𝗮 𝗵𝗮𝗷𝗶𝗺𝗲 𝘅 𝗳𝗲𝗺!𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿

MAN IN THE MIRRORㄑyou knew you shouldn't come to this abandoned house, but your friends forced you to go with them. it was a huge mistake to look into the old mirror expecting to see your reflection, but instead, a boy was staring at you with a wide and big smile from the other side.

𝗷𝗶𝗮𝗻𝗴𝘀𝗵𝗶!𝘀𝘂𝗼 𝗵𝗮𝘆𝗮𝘁𝗼 𝘅 𝗳𝗲𝗺!𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿

THE CORPSE'S BRIDEㄑfinding a red envelope with money often symbolizes marriage, but sometimes luck is just on your side as you pick it up in the city center. what you didn't know is that you accepted а marriage proposal. and this is how the suo family tricked you, a living woman into becoming the ghost bride of their deceased son.

𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲𝘄𝗼𝗹𝗳!𝘀𝗮𝗸𝘂𝗿𝗮 𝗵𝗮𝗿𝘂𝗸𝗮 𝘅 𝗳𝗲𝗺!𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿

STANDING NEXT TO YOUㄑhis instinct is quicker and more sensitive to anything, especially when it comes to your safety. he smells danger before anyone else can, even if you have a spider in your room, he will come to your rescue. he denies the fact that he likes you even when his tail wags when you compliment him out of the blue.

deal’s a deal, my little puppet! i’ve got plans for your world, big plans! to achieve great things, one must embrace the chaos. i’ll be watching you! i’m just a dimension away!

#✧* ꜝ weirdmageddon #✧* ꜝ kiki's flufftober 2024 #[IMPORTANT] some works may be published after october because i started university #✧* ꜝ wind breaker #wind breaker #wind breaker x reader #windbreaker x reader #wind breaker fluff #flufftober

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bargainsleuthbooks · 4 months ago

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Book Reviews: Kennedy Edition #NetGalley #NewBooks Jackie: A Novel; Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, Our Jackie: Public Claims on a Private Life; Ask Not: The Kennedys and the Women They Destroyed

It's time for another round-up of reviews of new or soon-to-be published books. This time, I'm reviewing four books about the #Kennedys. #NetGalley #ARCReview #BookReview #Asknot #LittleBrownandcompany #ourjackie #nyupress #jackieanovel

Anyone that has followed this blog for any length of time knows that much like the British Royal Family, I am down for most any book on the Kennedys. This year, I have already read four new books that shed more light on the family that some call American royalty, some more flattering than others. Here’s a round-up! Most books can be found at the affiliate links below or try your local library!…

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a-skirmish-of-wit-and-lit · 6 months ago

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Book Review: Knife River by Justine Champine

Knife River is a captivating debut that centers around a pair of sisters, Jess and Liz, who are anguished over their mother's unsolved disappearance. While one of them (Jess) has taken to running from the tragedy, living a nomadic existence as she skips from city to city, girlfriend to girlfriend, the other (Liz), has remained behind in their hometown, cloistered in their old family home and pouring over missing persons cases.

Fifteen years have lapsed when the call they've been waiting for yet dreading comes through: their mother's remains have been discovered.

This sends Jess back to Knife River in the hopes of finally finding closure. Of having an answer. However, with their mother's bones having been exposed to the elements for so long, any evidence they had hoped to find has run cold, with leads running stale and old suspects haunting them like a specter, leaving them with more questions than ever.

This was more of an atmospheric, character-driven exploration of grief than it was a cold case thriller, but I found that was what gave the story resonance and poignancy. Because of that, the strokes of the plot are more introspective in nature, with more internal rather than external movement happening. It's less about solving the case than it is about readers gaining insight into how this profound trauma has equally, but diametrically, frozen Jess and Liz and time. They're both stuck. Stagnated. Up to their chins in sorrow, and fear, and puzzlement--with neither one of them knowing how to move on.

The story's main strength was demonstrating how the two sisters were tethered by this tragic event. I liked seeing their enduring bond, also the way love and hurt and mystery twisted how they each coped with the loss of their mother. I did think Jess's romantic entanglements left something to be desired, though. They felt disjointed, distracting at times, leaving me feeling unmoored and uninterested. That said, I did think this was an intimate and harrowing portrayal of grief.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC in exchange for my review.

3/5 stars

**Follow me on Goodreads

#ashlee bree's book reviews #knife river #justine champine #arcs #mystery #thriller #literary fiction #lgbtq #recs: ashlee approved!#read february 2024 #published may 2024 #bookblr #booklr #book reviews #book recs

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deanncastiel · 6 months ago

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2024 Book #152

Title: Merciless Saviors Author: H.E. Edgmon Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult, LGBTQIA+ Series: The Ouroboros, Book 2

That day at the First Church of Gracie changed everything for Gem Echols, and not just because Marian and Poppy betrayed them. Forced to use the Ouroboros knife on Zephyr, who had kidnapped their parents, Gem now has the power of the God of Air. While for any other god things might work out okay, the Magician—whose role within the pantheon is to keep the balance—having the power of another god has thrown everything into chaos. The Goddess of Death can now reanimate corpses; the God of Art’s powers are now corrupted and twisted, giving life to his macabre creations; and, while the God of Land has always been able to communicate with creatures of the Earth, now everyone can hear their cries. As Gem, Rory, and Enzo search for a way to restore the balance without sacrificing themselves, new horrors make them question how far they're willing to go. In the end, Gem may be forced to fully embrace their merciless nature and kill off their own humanity—if it ever really existed in the first place.

Rating: 4 ⭐

Quick thoughts: liked the first one better, this plot meandered quite a bit, wanted several characters to die but alas, a+ for polyamory, enjoyed the ending.

#Merciless Saviors #The Ouroboros #H.E. Edgmon #2024 reads #bri's adventures in literature #i feel like i wanted more #but i can't wait until i get my SEs #will i ever publish my may wrap up?? who knows!!!

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cryptofmadness · 7 months ago

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INTERVIEW: Rich Sala (Warrant Publishing/Shudder and Vampiress Carmilla magazines)

Interview conducted by Chet Reams

Rich Sala is the Publisher at Warrant Publishing Company and has granted us at Crypt of MADness magazine an exclusive interview, for which we are very, very greatful! This interview was conducted over means of electronic correspondence in April 2024.

Chet Reams: Hello Rich! Thanks for agreeing to an interview!! Rich Sala: Thank you for taking an interest in Warrant Publishing Company and for reaching out.

Reams: So first off, how did Warrant Publishing/The Creeps magazine get started? Sala: Back in 2012, I was filling in some holes in my Warren magazine collection. While browsing the internet, I decided to do a few searches to if I could find anything similar to the old Warren magazines being produced for the current market. I saw a lot of horror comics, including the Dark Horse reboots of Creepy and Eerie and the Dynamite Vampirella titles, but almost everything I saw was being produced in the smaller, standard floppy comic book size, approximately 6.5’ x 10” with typically about 32 pages. There were absolutely no magazine sized black and white horror comics with 50 plus pages and none were being created with the classic horror art and story styles that I loved so much as a youngster. I was at a crossroads in my life so I decided to move forward with a serious attempt at contacting some of the original Warren artists and writers and reassembling some of the old Warren crew to help create a full-sized 8.5” x 11” black and white illustrated horror magazine. The first issue took two years to assemble. It was a modest 36 pages, with plans to expand to 52 pages if The Creeps #2 was possible. I assumed that since we featured four original Warren artists in the first magazine, The Creeps would be picked up by Diamond Comic Distributors right away, but sadly, it was not to be. The Diamond buyer at the time rejected our magazine. I’d already invested tens of thousands of dollars in the project so I had no choice but to try to recoup some of my initial investment. In June, 2014, I started selling The Creeps #1 solely through our website, while investing in a few Facebook promotions to help get the word out. Without Diamond, I was sure that The Creeps was going to bite the dust with issues #1. As it turned out, there was an extremely strong interest in the concept of the magazine from the older Warren fans and collectors, and online sales started pouring in. Within about 5 weeks, I’d tripled my initial investment and Warrant Publishing Company was in business. I continued The Creeps with the intention of producing the magazine twice annually. The second issue was released in December, 2014 and I submitted copies to a few national magazine distributors. One of those distributors, INGRAM (now defunct), contacted me saying that they were interested in distributing The Creeps through the Barnes and Noble bookstore chain, the nation’s largest, with a popular newsstand magazine section in each of their 700 locations. They required that the magazine move to a quarterly release schedule if they were to carry the book. I agreed, and The Creeps became a nationally distributed quarterly publication in Spring, 2015. The Creeps #3 sold so well through INGRAM that they sent us an extremely rare re-stocking order to replenish the sold out copies in many of their outlets. Then, in late 2016, I was contacted by a newly hired magazine buyer at Diamond Comic Distributors who wanted to distribute The Creeps magazine through Diamond. They started with The Creeps #10, which became their #1 selling magazine title right out of the gate.

Reams: What about Vampiress Carmilla magazine? Sala: We wanted to create a sister magazine for The Creeps, with a different kind of horror host. A Vampire character made sense, so we dug into the archives at the local library and finally settled on the title character from the public domain horror classic by author Sheridan Le Fanu, Carmilla. She is a beautiful young Vampiress who never ages. We trademarked the title and launched Vampiress Carmilla magazine in December, 2020 as a bi-monthly publication. Each magazine is released in the months between each bi-monthly issue of Shudder magazine, exactly how James Warren used to leap-frog releases of Creepy and Eerie magazine back in the 1960s.

Reams: Obviously there have been some legal issues with the owners of CREEPY/EERIE magazine, New Comic Company LLC, as they filed a lawsuit against you a couple years ago, which was eventually settled out of court. (The aforementioned lawsuit was for copyright infringement which is odd, because none of their material was used!) Was there ever any talk with New Comic Company, LLC about licensing out “CREEPY” and Uncle Creepy, as opposed to (what seems would be their intent ) to stop you from continuing The Creeps/Shudder? Sala: I can’t comment on the negotiations or terms of the settlement due to the included non-disclosure agreement. I will say that the transition from The Creeps to Shudder was seamless. Surprisingly, the orders from both our newsstand distributors and Diamond Comic Distributors increased by about 30% after the name change, which a nice, unexpected surprise. Go figure! LOL!

Reams: How did you gather the team of artists and writers for the magazine? Sala: We reached out to a lot of Warren creators in the beginning and the response was very positive. We published work from a couple dozen original Warren creators during our first few years and by 2017, the late, great Nicola Cuti, who had held three different editorial positions at Warren Publishing Company over the years, had become our associate editor. Our stable to newer artists either contacted us with samples of their work or we contacted them after seeing their work and determining that their style would be a good fit for our books.

Reams: Several of the legendary legacy artists and writers have passed away in the years since you started publishing your comic mags. Ken Kelly, Richard Corben, and others come to mind… How has that affected things? Any chance of getting more newer contemporary horror/fantasy artists to do front covers? Or for that matter, even back covers, variant covers, and the like? Sala: Not anytime soon. There is still a great wealth of work available from the original Warren cover artists. Those guys are aging out quickly so we feel an urgent need to commission as much work as possible from greats like Sanjulian, Jeff Easley, Don Maitz and others while they are still able to produce work. We’ve already lost Basil Gogos and the aforementioned Richard Corben and Ken Kelly, who produced close to a dozen original cover commissions for our magazines over the years. Having covers by actual Warren cover artists is instrumental in creating AUTHENTIC Warren-styled magazines, which is the sole purpose of Warrant Publishing Company. I’ve always thought Variant cover(s) were a money grab by publishers who want to re-sell the same book to their faithful readers over and over by slapping on a half dozen different covers. If a variant cover is so great, put it on its own damn book. Warren never released a variant cover and neither will we.

Reams: What happens with the original artwork pieces that are used in the magazine? Are they kept or at least retained as photo-stats, digital scans, or something else? Sala: Most of the work is digital these days, so there is no original art. I retain multiple backup files of EVERTHING. I have about half of the original story pages from The Creeps #1, but beyond that, I usually let the artists keep their own originals if they work in traditional media. I do have a few select original pages by some of the original Warren illustrators in our archives through. A page that EC artist Angelo Torres illustrated for Shudder #6 is among my most treasured pieces.

Reams: What kind of stories do you look for specifically for use in Shudder mag (formerly “The Creeps”) and Vampiress Carmilla? Sala: With very few exceptions, I look for work that would fit perfectly into a collection of 1970s illustrated horror stories without standing out. Artists who work digitally must be able to produce work that accurately mimics traditional media.

Reams: Are there any stories you flat-out would not print in the magazine? Sala: Sure. We produce PG-13 magazines with adult horror themes in the Warren style. We would never run anything overtly sexual like some of the so-called “modern horror comics.” No worms crawling out of, or cutting up women’s sexual organs - things that are obvious gore p-rn.

Reams: This is more of an “entertaining” question, but out of these three, which would you choose as a favorite series: EERIE, VAMPIRELLA or CREEPY? (of the Warren magazine series-run titles) Sala: My introduction to illustrated horror was Warren’s Creepy magazine. I saw my older sister’s copy of Creepy #14 before I could even read. Those pictures freaked me out and they are burned into my brain to this day. Warren’s Creepy is the first and best in illustrated horror. At least in the large magazine format that I prefer.

Reams: Do you have any kinds of exclusive scoops/announcements about the magazine(s) Warrant Publishing does, that you could tell us here at Crypt Of MADness mag? Sala: We’re launching a Shudder Magazine Fan Club this Summer, 2024 and we’re putting the finishing touches on some Shudder and Vampiress Carmilla T-shirt designs. Coming soon!

Reams: Thanks again for the interview, Rich!! Sala: You’re welcome.

#interviews #May 2024 #Articles #Warrant Publishing Company #Rich Sala #Shudder magazine #Vampiress Carmilla magazine

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fuckyeah-beringandwellsfics · 7 months ago

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Natural Phenomena

submitted by: anonymous

This fic is user-locked - you need to be an AO3 user to access it.

Natural Phenomena (17863 words) by beyondthesea Chapters: 3/3 Fandom: Warehouse 13 Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Myka Bering/Helena "H. G." Wells Characters: Myka Bering, Helena "H. G." Wells, Pete Lattimer, Claudia Donovan, Steve Jinks Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Storm Chasers Summary: There's nothing as lonely and volatile as the Great Plains in late spring, except for, perhaps, the woman standing at the bar, but that's what draws Myka to tornadoes and it's also what draws her to Helena.

Please tell us why you like this fic so much!

A good AU with our traumatized heroines about a field I didn’t know much before

---

Remember that you can submit fics to be featured here, too! Here's the link to the submission form (Google Form)!

#warehouse 13 #wh13 #w13 #bering and wells #bering & wells #myka bering #helena wells #helena g wells #natural phenomena #beyondthesea #I don't know their Tumblr username #so if anyone has it please let me know so I can tag them!#anonymous submission #published 2018 #submitted 2024 05 #2024 #may 2024

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ciboriaadastra · 8 months ago

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if DC wasn't insistent on spreading their artists thin and putting embargos on IPs against their own writers, I could have had Batman: Gargoyle of Gotham #3 in my hands by now

#not so much that these are the issues directly affecting Rafael Grampá #but that these issues seem to affect comic production and scheduling in general #so BGOG 3 was taken completely off the calendar for like 2 months and got rescheduled for May #which is crazy bc if the series had no interruptions it would have been finished by now #because it's iirc a six issue miniseries and it was published in september 2023 meaning a final issue in feb 2024 a.k.a. last month #this is why I normally try to get into stuff late so everything is out and I don't have to deal with waiting #the yearning for my husband (batman) to come home from the war (his crusade against crime). he went out for patrol and didn't return.#my wife in rotting armor

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sophiamcdougall · 11 months ago

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You're a reasonably informed person on the internet. You've experienced things like no longer being able to get files off an old storage device, media you've downloaded suddenly going poof, sites and forums with troves full of people's thoughts and ideas vanishing forever. You've heard of cybercrime. You've read articles about lost media. You have at least a basic understanding that digital data is vulnerable, is what I'm saying. I'm guessing that you're also aware that history is, you know... important? And that it's an ongoing study, requiring ... data about how people live? And that it's not just about stanning celebrities that happen to be dead? Congratulations, you are significantly better-informed than the British government! So they're currently like "Oh hai can we destroy all these historical documents pls? To save money? Because we'll digitise them first so it's fine! That'll be easy, cheap and reliable -- right? These wills from the 1850s will totally be fine for another 170 years as a PNG or whatever, yeah? We didn't need to do an impact assesment about this because it's clearly win-win! We'd keep the physical wills of Famous People™ though because Famous People™ actually matter, unlike you plebs. We don't think there are any equalities implications about this, either! Also the only examples of Famous People™ we can think of are all white and rich, only one is a woman and she got famous because of the guy she married. Kisses!"

Yes, this is the same Government that's like "Oh no removing a statue of slave trader is erasing history :(" You have, however, until 23 February 2024 to politely inquire of them what the fuck they are smoking. And they will have to publish a summary of the responses they receive. And it will look kind of bad if the feedback is well-argued, informative and overwhelmingly negative and they go ahead and do it anyway. I currently edit documents including responses to consultations like (but significantly less insane) than this one. Responses do actually matter. I would particularly encourage British people/people based in the UK to do this, but as far as I can see it doesn't say you have to be either. If you are, say, a historian or an archivist, or someone who specialises in digital data do say so and draw on your expertise in your answers. This isn't a question of filling out a form. You have to manually compose an email answering the 12 questions in the consultation paper at the link above. I'll put my own answers under the fold. Note -- I never know if I'm being too rude in these sorts of things. You probably shouldn't be ruder than I have been.

Please do not copy and paste any of this: that would defeat the purpose. This isn't a petition, they need to see a range of individual responses. But it may give you a jumping-off point.

Question 1: Should the current law providing for the inspection of wills be preserved?

Yes. Our ability to understand our shared past is a fundamental aspect of our heritage. It is not possible for any authority to know in advance what future insights they are supporting or impeding by their treatment of material evidence. Safeguarding the historical record for future generations should be considered an extremely important duty.

Question 2: Are there any reforms you would suggest to the current law enabling wills to be inspected?

No.

Question 3: Are there any reasons why the High Court should store original paper will documents on a permanent basis, as opposed to just retaining a digitised copy of that material?

Yes. I am amazed that the recent cyber attack on the British Library, which has effectively paralysed it completely, not been sufficient to answer this question for you. I also refer you to the fate of the Domesday Project. Digital storage is useful and can help more people access information; however, it is also inherently fragile. Malice, accident, or eventual inevitable obsolescence not merely might occur, but absolutely should be expected. It is ludicrously naive and reflects a truly unpardonable ignorance to assume that information preserved only in digital form is somehow inviolable and safe, or that a physical document once digitised, never need be digitised again..At absolute minimum, it should be understood as certain that at least some of any digital-only archive will eventually be permanently lost. It is not remotely implausible that all of it would be. Preserving the physical documents provides a crucial failsafe. It also allows any errors in reproduction -- also inevitable-- to be, eventually, seen and corrected. Note that maintaining, upgrading and replacing digital infrastructure is not free, easy or reliable. Over the long term, risks to the data concerned can only accumulate.

"Unlike the methods for preserving analog documents that have been honed over millennia, there is no deep precedence to look to regarding the management of digital records. As such, the processing, long-term storage, and distribution potential of archival digital data are highly unresolved issues. [..] the more digital data is migrated, translated, and re-compressed into new formats, the more room there is for information to be lost, be it at the microbit-level of preservation. Any failure to contend with the instability of digital storage mediums, hardware obsolescence, and software obsolescence thus meets a terminal end—the definitive loss of information. The common belief that digital data is safe so long as it is backed up according to the 3-2-1 rule (3 copies on 2 different formats with 1 copy saved off site) belies the fact that it is fundamentally unclear how long digital information can or will remain intact. What is certain is that its unique vulnerabilities do become more pertinent with age." -- James Boyda, On Loss in the 21st Century: Digital Decay and the Archive, Introduction.

Question 4: Do you agree that after a certain time original paper documents (from 1858 onwards) may be destroyed (other than for famous individuals)? Are there any alternatives, involving the public or private sector, you can suggest to their being destroyed?

Absolutely not. And I would have hoped we were past the "great man" theory of history. Firstly, you do not know which figures will still be considered "famous" in the future and which currently obscure individuals may deserve and eventually receive greater attention. I note that of the three figures you mention here as notable enough to have their wills preserved, all are white, the majority are male (the one woman having achieved fame through marriage) and all were wealthy at the time of their death. Any such approach will certainly cull evidence of the lives of women, people of colour and the poor from the historical record, and send a clear message about whose lives you consider worth remembering.

Secondly, the famous and successsful are only a small part of our history. Understanding the realities that shaped our past and continue to mould our present requires evidence of the lives of so-called "ordinary people"!

Did you even speak to any historians before coming up with this idea?

Entrusting the documents to the private sector would be similarly disastrous. What happens when a private company goes bust or decides that preserving this material is no longer profitable? What reasonable person, confronted with our crumbling privatised water infrastructure, would willingly consign any part of our heritage to a similar fate?

Question 5: Do you agree that there is equivalence between paper and digital copies of wills so that the ECA 2000 can be used?

No. And it raises serious questions about the skill and knowledge base within HMCTS and the government that the very basic concepts of data loss and the digital dark age appear to be unknown to you. I also refer you to the Domesday Project.

Question 6: Are there any other matters directly related to the retention of digital or paper wills that are not covered by the proposed exercise of the powers in the ECA 2000 that you consider are necessary?

Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.

Question 7: If the Government pursues preserving permanently only a digital copy of a will document, should it seek to reform the primary legislation by introducing a Bill or do so under the ECA 2000?

Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.

Question 8: If the Government moves to digital only copies of original will documents, what do you think the retention period for the original paper wills should be? Please give reasons and state what you believe the minimum retention period should be and whether you consider the Government’s suggestion of 25 years to be reasonable.

There is no good version of this plan. The physical documents should be preserved.

Question 9: Do you agree with the principle that wills of famous people should be preserved in the original paper form for historic interest?

This question betrays deep ignorance of what "historic interest" actually is. The study of history is not simply glorified celebrity gossip. If anything, the physical wills of currently famous people could be considered more expendable as it is likely that their contents are so widely diffused as to be relatively "safe", whereas the wills of so-called "ordinary people" will, especially in aggregate, provide insights that have not yet been explored.

Question 10: Do you have any initial suggestions on the criteria which should be adopted for identifying famous/historic figures whose original paper will document should be preserved permanently?

Abandon this entire lamentable plan. As previously discussed, you do not and cannot know who will be considered "famous" in the future, and fame is a profoundly flawed criterion of historical significance.

Question 11: Do you agree that the Probate Registries should only permanently retain wills and codicils from the documents submitted in support of a probate application? Please explain, if setting out the case for retention of any other documents.

No, all the documents should be preserved indefinitely.

Question 12: Do you agree that we have correctly identified the range and extent of the equalities impacts under each of these proposals set out in this consultation? Please give reasons and supply evidence of further equalities impacts as appropriate.

No. You appear to have neglected equalities impacts entirely. As discussed, in your drive to prioritise "famous people", your plan will certainly prioritise the white, wealthy and mostly the male, as your "Charles Dickens, Charles Darwin and Princess Diana" examples amply indicate. This plan will create a two-tier system where evidence of the lives of the privileged is carefully preserved while information regarding people of colour, women, the working class and other disadvantaged groups is disproportionately abandoned to digital decay and eventual loss. Current and future historians from, or specialising in the history of minority groups will be especially impoverished by this.

#ukpol #uk politics #fuck the tories #lost media #data loss #cultural vandalism

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