It Talks!

Gary Handman (ghandman@library.berkeley.edu)
Tue, 10 Feb 1998 17:06:01 -0800 (PST)

Wull...I realize that this is a list for videofolk, but I'm gonna but this
news out there anyway... The UCB Media Center has recently been cutting
deals with the Berkeley Language Center to digitize and web deliver some
or all of the speeches in the Berkeley Speech archives. These are 1-2
hour lectures and talks given on campus over the last 25 years by a whole
mess o' cultural heavies: Malcolm X, J. Robert Oppenheimer, A.L. Kroeber,
Carlos Fuentes, Chinua Achebe, Michel Foucault, Gary Snyder....and more!

The language lab is pressing audio CD's of these speeches from original
tape
masters; we're encoding the stuff for StreamWorks (proprietary software
which our systems guys seem to have opted for) and shooting it over to
the library's server...

You can check out the first couple of results at:
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC

Some caveats: you need a sound card in your machine (obviously), and you
need to download Streamworks software (available free via the url cited
above). Streamworks is a little quirky...I'd be very interested in
hearing from you re how this stuff sounds far from Berkeley...

So? What's this all have to do with video? A lot (maybe). I hope to use
this project as a springboard to get local and regional funding for other
digital media collection
initiatives, including (perhaps) building 5-10 minute video previews into
the UCB web site... The audio part of this project is relatively cheap
and easy; the video part is gonna be pretty daunting in terms of cost,
technical requirements, and access issues...

Stay tuned...

Gary Handman
Director
Media Resources Center
Moffitt Library
UC Berkeley, CA 94720-6000
510-643-8566
ghandman@library.berkeley.edu