In article , David Looser
wrote:

It's precisely the inaccessibility of these technologies that makes them
fascinating IMO. Apart from 4-track "CinemaScope" mag stereo I'm also
interested in the elaborate "Fantasound" system used to record and
reproduce the soundtrack of Fantasia, for which no original recordings
or sound prints survive (the oldest surviving version of the Fantasia
soundtrack is a 1955 vintage magnetic film copy).

That is another classic example of the perils of our current copyright
situation. That something we can now regard as a 'work of art' or of very
great interest to later generations has been 'lost' or 'degraded' due to
the lack of care of those who owned the copyright.

The film studios are a nice case of this for film after film.

Witness also the way the BBC threw out or wiped so much "because no-one
would ever want to hear it again". Only now to be cursed for doing so.

One of the advantages of 'home recordings' and people making copies in
other formats is that it helps protect against such careless losses.

Note also the interesting recent example where hundreds of old 'Paul
Temple' radio programmes have been re-found. The BBC had no idea these
still existed - but in Australia they'd known they had copies all along.
:-)

Slainte,

Jim

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