Digital Preservation Song Challenge

Serena Coates is Coordinator of Digital Preservation (Preservation Services) and Rachel Merrick is Metadata Specialist at State Library of Queensland

With more conferences being held south of the equator (iPres in 2014, IDCC in 2019) for the first time, and local communities of practice growing in numbers (Australasia Preserves, and the National and State Libraries of Australia DP CoP), the digital preservation community is Australasia is growing stronger by the minute.  So why not put this growing enthusiasm to music?

A recent thread on the Australasia Preserves web forum posed the question – “Does AusPreserves need a theme song?”.  A couple of DP themed songs already exist, but the creative juices got flowing, and ideas were thrown in to the mix – “If I Could Turn Back Time” (Cher), and “Born this Way” (Lady Gaga) were put up as two possible candidates.

On behalf of the NSLA community of practice, we took it one step further, and issued a song challenge – to create a parody of an existing song, or write an original song with the theme of digital preservation.  More ideas flowed - “Baby One More Time” (Britney Spears), and “[Files] Will Survive” (Gloria Gaynor). 

At State Library of Queensland, we settled on a parody of “All the Single Ladies” by Beyonce (“if you liked it then you should have put a checksum on it”!).  Following the digital preservation principle of “don’t worry if it’s not perfect – doing something is better than doing nothing”, in less than 48 hours we wrote some lyrics, choreographed a dance, bought black leotards and convinced our visual media technician to record it all for us.  The result has been described by one colleague as “brave”!  We were going more for entertaining/amusing/educational! 

Focus on the lyrics rather than the singing/dancing – we think Beyonce’s job is safe!  We hope you find it as fun to watch as we did to make.  Now we hope that others take up the challenge of both creating parody songs, and preserving digital files, as we can’t wait to see what they come up with!

Check out the video here:

All the Corrupt Files (Single Ladies [Put a Ring on it] parody) from State Library of Queensland on Vimeo.

or if you don’t have time, the lyrics are below for your entertainment!

All the corrupt files

All the pixelation

All the file formats

All the obsolescence

All the metadata

All the preservation

All the long term access

Now make your back-ups!

Up in the lab, just looked up

The only copy of this thing

A bit decided to flip, and now you’re gonna trip

‘Cause no-one else can access it

Didn’t check JHOVE, didn’t check DROID

Didn’t make any derivatives

Forensic toolkit, you need for this

You didn’t check fixity

'Cause if you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

Don’t be mad once you see that you lost it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

'Cause if you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

Don’t be mad once you see that you lost it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

Check PRONOM for my SIPs, PREMIS for my DIPs

And don’t forget the A-I-Ps

If they act up, files get corrupt

OAIS notifies me

Got lossless compression, did I mention?

No worries on format migration

Born digital or turned, you won't get burned

You got a preservation policy

'Cause if you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

Don’t be mad once you see that you lost it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

'Cause if you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

Don’t be mad once you see that you lost it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

Don’t assume your content will not corrupt

It's not that kind of world

Good files are what we deserve, what we preserve

Make a plan that saves them then takes them

And delivers them to a user base, to the internet and beyond

Pull them into your arms

Commit to save the ones you want

If you don’t, you’ll be forlorn

And long term access will be gone

All the corrupt files

All the pixelation

All the file formats

All the obsolescence

All the metadata

All the preservation

All the long term access

Now make your back-ups

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

One, oh, one

Oh, one, one, oh, oh, one

Oh, one, one

'Cause if you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

Don’t be mad once you see that you lost it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it

Don’t be mad once you see that you lost it

If you liked it, then you should have put a checksum on it