2010 Digital Humanities London - Evolution of Preservation
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Digital Humanities 2010 London Parallels between biological evolution and digital evolution. With Peter Doorn
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2010 Digital Humanities London - Evolution of Preservation
- 1. Ecology of Longevity the relevance of evolutionary theory for digital preservation Peter . Doorn @ dans.knaw.nl Dirk . Roorda @ dans.knaw.nl http://www.dans.knaw.nl/en
- 2. Sustainability http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainability the capacity to endure. In ecology the word describes how biological systems remain diverse and productive over time http://brtf.sdsc.edu/biblio/BRTF_Final_Report.pdf
- 3. caveats ✔ parallel patterns ✖ prediction ✔ exploration ✖ scientifically tested ✔ partially testable
- 4. Darwin Lamarck populations of organisms in an environment living and reproducing imperfect inheritance of traits inheritance environment cannot sustain of acquired properties offspring much speedier individuals have different evolution survival chances valid for cultural natural selection of “the fittest” inheritance/heredity ✖Mendel ✖genetics ✖DNA
- 5. Modern synthesis heredity works through genes, collectively: DNA DNA is copied, recombined damaged, repaired, mutated At the core of life is information processing.
- 6. ParadoxesLessons (i) individuals don’t survive, the system does (ii) survival is an unintentional result (iii) there is no long-term, only short-term ... with extensions ...
- 7. complexity science sociology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_ school_(sociology) patterns and processes of individuals versus communities M. Mitchell economy Waldrop psychology mechanics Critical Events in Evolving Networks - ... biology! http://www.creen.org/ Back from the Brink - http://ideas.repec.org/p/dgr/umamer/2000005.html
- 8. hardware evolution in ict tube computing capacity transistor mainframe batch media chip numbers personal computer text cloud image audio video networking simulation device software organisation dos-windows-android world-wide basic – pascal – java wordperfect – ODF - TEI
- 9. strategies to preserve • emulation • preserve the environment of the data • migration • adapt the data to the environment
- 10. Parallel 1: use and retain current digital preservation thought first preserve, then re-use perverse consequence: preserving too well prevents re-use! evolution gets rid of unused functions color view - eyes - odor receptors evolutionary preservation thought first re-use, then preserve
- 11. Parallel 2: copies and evolvability copies are free to evolve originals are fixed evolution is not interested in originals make copies in evolvable formats migration preferable over emulation http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1000112
- 12. Parallel 3: Sexual Selection indicators of survival success promote mating hard-to-fake considerable investment
- 13. Paradigms: bio - tech part construction machine assembly line identical copies refactoring market
- 14. Paradigms: analog - digital
- 15. Toy ecosystem clouds = { workspaces } http://www.duraspace.org/duracloud.php works = { copies } users = owners of workspaces
- 16. Infrastructure rules • I access therefore I copy • accessing a work is copying it to your own workspace • the cloud may de-duplicate identical copies in different workspaces • for storage optimisation • the cloud may re-duplicate copies • for access optimisation • the cloud extracts metadata from works and has mechanisms to search
- 17. Usability rules • the cloud provides a linking system between works • not between copies • intelligent persistent identifiers • the cloud maintains a system of access rights • which is respected by the linking behaviour
- 18. Economic rules • users pay for their workspace • for storage capacity multiplied by time: • GByte * month • users pay for making a copy of a work • this fee will come to the good of current owners of a copy of the same work • divided in equal parts • this fee is not for intellectual property, but is purely infrastructural
- 19. Preservation rules • a preservation institution is just a workspace user • all users may request from the cloud • the number of extant copies of works • a preservation institution specialises in: • rare works!
- 20. Incentives for preservation • adding value to a work implies • more access => more income • keeping only rare works implies • every access is lucrative • a surviving preservation institution keeps • looking for value enhancement • improving usability of its resources • throwing away abundant resources
- 21. Ecology of sustainable information • financial incentive to preserve • optimisations in value / cost • data use is instrumental in preservation • {actors} ≈ {stakeholders} it is already faintly realistic
- 22. Simulation • play with the monetary parameters • study models with interesting behaviour • maybe there are emergent patterns • hopefully meaningful in the real world
- 23. Evolution and Digital Preservation Thank You a preservation institution helps rare works to survive and thus sustains its own survival the Future is in the Clouds
Editor's Notes
- title
- “Solving” Digital Preservationintro (2)sustainability (from wikipedia) endure – diverse – natural resourcesblue ribbon report – incentives value economy(handy review: http://www.sdsc.edu/News%20Items/PR022610_blueribbon.html)
- intro (3)-an evolutionary approach trades certainty for enhanced insight in probabilities-past successes of biological evolution are no guarantees for future success of digital evolution: only parallels can be drawn-the parallels between biological evolution and digital preservation serve exploration and heuristics-it is not yet tested but it will lead to testable hypotheses (see example at the end)
- core - biologycrash course in 19th century evolution theory
- core - biologyevolutionary biologyThe modern synthesis is Darwinian evolution plus genetics: the mechanism of heredity unveiled.Consequences:life is much more an information process than previously thought: a deep connection with computers: symbolic processingthe provenance of life is much clearer: the genetic clockthere are more parallels between digital preservation and the evolution of life
- core – paradoxes and lessons1. what survives is life as an ecosystem, not individuals, not even individual speciesin digital preservation: we should focus on preserving the ecosystem in which information thrives, not only on the individual datasets2. trying to keep data exactly as it is (media conservation, bitstream preservation) prevents it from evolving: it will die out.Preservation involves active transformation, on all levels.So what is preserved, you might wonder?3. in biological evolution, long term survival is largely unintentional and a matter of luck. The better chances, however are where species are versatile and evolving.In digital preservation, there are other activities that might contribute more to digital preservation than digital preservation proper: adding value to data by using it and commenting it; combining data, making data interoperable4. long term is sustainable short termEvery surviving species consists of individuals that overcome the daily dangers of the environment.A species can survive a long time if it accumulates techniques that can be used in other environments as well, or if it can evolve rapidly.In digital preservation, it is not handy to focus on the indeterminate future, not even on time-spans as the next 20 years or so.We should preserve the data now, in its most usable form, optimised for access and reuse, optimised for further transformation and interoperability. Then in the future it will take less effort to preserve the data for the next round of change.
- intro (4)the wikipedia article gives a nice overview.To be highlighted: warning against reductionism and too shallow biological models
- core – ictthe spectrum of change in ICTreflect on what has become obsolete
- core – preservationhow to preserve in a fast changing worldemulation: the preservation of dynamics, performancemigration: the preservation of semantics, meaning, informationsustainability factors: make the unit of preservation self-contained, self explanatory, self-everything
- core parallelsreproduction and metabolismwhat evolved first: the capability to reproduce or to metaboliseIn biology: probably there developed at first metabolic reactions in confined spaces, taking food stuffs from the environment, en secreting waste in turn. There was not yet a machinery for self-preservation or copying, it developed on the way.In digital preservation: you can not waitwith re-using till you have policies for preservation in place. The practice of using and re-using information preceeds the preservation of information.Paradox! In short term: you can only (re)use information that you have at hand (preserved).In the long run: you will loose information that you do not use, you will preserve for the long run that which has been used a lot.
- core – parallelsa good gene will not mutate in a population. If it does, it looses function, the individual will not procreate, the mutation is lost.but: sometimes genes get duplicated in the genome. One of the copies is free to evolve.In digital preservation: you can make a repository with ur-authentic copies, complying with the sustainability factors.But if nothing else is done, they are not optimised for access. If you make copies for access, then the changing needs of the users of the data will tend to change / migrate / transform the data. Over time, the new forms might become more important than the old authentic forms in the repository.
- core – parallelswhen a species evolves optimizing reproductive capacity at the expense of survival capacity for the individual.The male or female develop exaggerated characteristics on which they select each other.These features can be quite costly: antlers, peacock feathers. The features represent hard to fake interesting properties.Application in digital preservation: certificates, datasealofapprovals, assessment procedures, meant as sign that interoperability is safe.Quite costly, it might go out of hand with respect to the original goal.
- paradigm: biology versus technologysynthesis versus analysisvery different production processes
- core – a model of sustainable informationif you combine elements from google, bit-torrent, duracloud, lockss, persistent identifiers, you can in fact start realising this