The Future of Memory
A History of Lossless Format Standards in the Moving Image Archive

Jimi Jones (Author), Marek Jancovic (Author)

9780252088759

Paperback / softback, published 8 July 2025

216 pages, 12 black & white photographs, 4 tables
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.8 cm, 0.34 kg

“The first history of film was written in 1894, when cinema had not been born yet. A quarter of the twenty-first century has elapsed, and no global history of digital media is still in sight. It would be a daunting task, worthy of a Jorge Luis Borges story, but Jones and Jancovic have succeeded in writing a key chapter of it. Don’t be deterred by its acronyms: you don’t have to be a computer geek to enjoy getting lost in the labyrinth of media archives’ quixotic struggle against impermanence.”--Paolo Cherchi Usai, George Eastman Museum

A new generation of video standards promises lossless storage of digital objects for future generations. Jimi Jones and Marek Jancovic document the development and adoption of JPEG 2000, FFV1, MXF, and Matroska while investigating the social and material aspects of their design and the forces driving their journeys from niche to ubiquity.

Drawing on interviews with archivists and developers, Jones and Jancovic reveal the archive as a dynamic space where deeply entrenched social practices produce disagreements but also resourceful collaborations. They contrast the unprecedented rise of archivist-driven standardization and controversies around non-standard technology with the historical dominance of the film and broadcast industries. Throughout, the authors clarify the role of tech companies, software developers, film pirates, hackers, and other players with poorly understood roles in the process.

Acknowledgments