Last chance to play: A case study of sustaining national video digitisation capacity

Abstract

This paper presents a case study of how the Netherlands Institute for Sound & Vision responded to a structural crisis in magnetic video digitisation driven by carrier deterioration, technological obsolescence and market contraction. As the availability of legacy playback equipment, spare parts and specialist expertise declined, and commercial digitisation capacity reduced, the institute faced the prospect of losing the means to digitise significant portions of national audiovisual heritage. The paper examines the strategic decision to intervene directly by acquiring a large collection of legacy video equipment and retaining key technical expertise. It situates this intervention within a broader shift from earlier large-scale, publicly funded digitisation efforts towards a more constrained on-demand model, during which backlogs continued to grow and preservation risks intensified. The analysis identifies operational, organisational and knowledge-related risks associated with the investment, and outlines plans to re-establish scalable digitisation capacity within existing archival and technical infrastructures. The case demonstrates that sustaining audiovisual preservation capability is not solely a technical challenge but a strategic and systemic issue shaped by market dynamics and skills loss. It argues that long-term stewardship increasingly requires preservation of both media carriers and the means to reproduce them, supported by collaboration across institutional networks. This article is also included in The Business & Management Collection which can be accessed at http://hstalks.com/business.