For my service learning project, I partnered with the American Archive of Public Broadcasting and the Greater Boston Harbor PBS station, WGBH. WGBH was the first station to begin large-scale digitization of its assets, and manages digital content for the Mellon-funded publication efforts. I was given access to their AMS content management system and a spreadsheet to keep track of what files could be made accessible to the public.
This is an example of a portion of the spreadsheet.
An example of the file review interface.
During my onboarding meeting, we discussed the process for determining what programs could be published on the American Archive of Public Broadcasting's Online Reading Room. The main objective of my project was to determine whether there were any copyrighted materials present in each program and update the internal spreadsheet accordingly. I was instructed to skip through the recording and watch for content that didn't match the metadata, as well as any musical or theater content not created by the station that presented the material. My project partner also explained that there are some subjects that they prefer not to publish, such as children's programming, drama, performance, and international materials. I was also asked to note anything that might be considered sensitive content or be distressing to viewers. Over the course of the semester, I was able to review roughly 150 programs and make recommendations regarding any potential copyright issues or content warnings. Below are some of the programs that I reviewed that have been added to the Online Reading Room. Please note that most of these are raw footage that was later compiled into a completed program.