How should I permanently store digital photographs?

"timeOday" wrote in message
...

IMHO jpeg (not jpeg 2000) is perfectly safe in that regard.

WHY would you recommend a lossy format as an archival storage format?



Writable CDs have already been the
norm for about 7 years, and all new drives are backwards compatible with
them, and will be for the forseeable future.

Not according to the Luminous Landscape article on "Digital's Dirty Little
Secret." The writer cites examples of formats that were once in common use
that are now unavailable.

Responding to the rest of your post, as well, I just don't think it's
important to worry about hundreds of years.

You are stating an unqualified opinion, as though it were factual. The fact
is that countless archivists and digital libraries are struggling with this
problem, and there is no solution on the horizon. I quoted exper articles
in my previous posts, and you have just dismissed them with a wave of the
hand, and have suggested that there is no problem with archival storage with
today's media and file formats. Tell that to the Library of Congress and
they'll laugh at you.

It is irresponsible to suggest to an inquirer that he should, essentially,
"just burn it onto CD."





I disagree with the fears
of a "digital dark age." If digital information is more easily
destroyed, it is also replicated and distributed. Many images will not
survive, but billions upon billions will. Given that, it's vanity to
imagine that anybody will mourn the loss of your (or my) photographs.

"Mike F" wrote in message
news:xpCyd.245319$V41.53355@attbi_s52...
In general, I agree with what you are saying, but would
add a comment here -- when doing the "double copies"
thing, use different brands of media for the copies. For,
over in the alt.video.dvdr group there have been comments
recently of the Ritek G04 and G05 media (which people have
been very happy with in the past) "forgetting" what was written
within a fairly short period of time ( 6 months ). Use two
different manufacturers (not just different brand names which
may actually be the same) to do the backups. If one develops
read problems, refresh from the other one. Two copies in
different locations is great if you have a fire or something, but
if they both begin to forget at the same time, you lose.
I know -- no simple answer. As to whether or not anyone
cares about your pix 50 years from now, I know I have
really enjoyed being able to find old B/W pix from when my
dad was a kid (but then I am into genealogy stuff too). See
the picture at http://home.comcast.net/~mike.fields/genealog.htm
for a cute picture of my 87 year old father when he was a little
boy on the farm. Glad I found that one. Will my kids care in
50 years I hope so. Will anyone else care? In reality probably
not. I would suspect that jpg will be around for quite a while,
if not as a primary storage, then at least with converters for
whatever is current in the future. The trick is to at least make
the attempt to make sure the media is there if anyone wants
to look. It is easy to make a copy onto the "new standard" -
it is much harder to recover from old corrupted media.

mikey

"Jeremy" wrote in message
ink.net...

wrote in message
oups.com...

First concern is the availability of current file and data format.

So what would you guys say is the best file type, media format and
media type to use if I want them to be easily accessible for decades?


Welcome to the world of digital image preservation! Sorry that you were
hit
so hard by your experience with your "ancient" 8-year-old image files.
Actually, you received a valuable lesson from the School of Hard Knocks,
for
which you should be grateful. You learned while you were still able to
correct the problem. Others will not be so lucky.

The short answer to your question is to store files in UNCOMPRESSED TIF.
It
is the format of choice for virtually all libraries. Do not compress
the
TIF files, because the various compression schemes might become
unreadable
by editing programs in the future. Already there are reports of old
compressed TIF files not being able to be opened by modern editing
software.
Forget compression on your archived image files.

Use the "Master and Derivative" model for your storage media: in other
words, make TWO "Master Disks." Store one off-site (bank safe deposit
box,
relative or friend's home, etc.) Store it in a jewel box, keep it in a
dark
place and don't touch it. Store a duplicate "Master Disk" at home,
under
the same dark/temperature/humidity optimum conditions.

These "Master Disks" are used only to make derivative copies. If you
work
on your images, always work off the expendable Derivative Copy. If the
Derivative ever goes bad, use your on-site Master Disk to make a new
Derivative Copy, and then return the Master Disk back to hibernation.
Never
use the Master Disk for any other purpose. If your on-site Master Disk
goes
bad, or if it is lost in a fire, flood or theft, then make a NEW on-site
Master Disk from the one you stored off-site, in the Safe Deposit Box.

You might consider including an Index Print along with your Master and
Derivative Disks, just so you (or your descendants) can see what is
contained on them.

This is a far cry from storing negatives in archival plastic pages, and
storing prints in albums (or in shoeboxes).

Even after taking all these precautions, you will have to provide for
migrating the data to the latest file format and media type as time goes
on.
Plan on doing this every 7-10 years. This is the Achilles Heel of
digital
preservation: you cannot be assured that this migration effort will
continue
after your demise. Just think about the proverbial shoebox full of
photos
found in Grandma's attic: for one thing, people tend to move more often
and
there is less chance that our historical images will be left undisturbed
for
generations. And (more importantly) the photos Grandma stored were
visible
without any special equipment or software. What if those Mac images
that
you had were just a few years older? You might not have had the means
to
decode them, and you would have probably discarded them, rather than pay
to
have them converted onto a current medium.

Kodak, on their website, even recommends that you consider long-term
storage
of your important images by making PRINTS of them, and storing them in
archival albums, in appropriate temperature/humidity/darkness
conditions.
The fact is that, for the typical consumer, the lowly PRINT stands the
greatest chance of long-term survival, because it requires little
long-term
maintenance.

If you are starting to have reservations about digital file longevity,
you
are not alone. I recommend that you have a look at this article, that
discusses the issue better than I can. "Digital's Dirty Little Secret"

http://www.vividlight.com/articles/1513.htm

Even large digital libraries are affected by the need to periodically
renew
their digital assets onto newer file formats and storage media. What
makes
them different from us consumers is that they have planned for, and
budgeted
for, this continual file maintenance and renewal. We ordinary folks
must
rely upon our children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren to care for
our
image files. There is no assurance that they will have any interest in
doing so. More likely, the piles of disks will gather dust until
somebody
decides to throw them out, since they can't read them. At least prints
have
a chance of surviving, because their historical value is apparent at
first
glance. Not so with those CDs or DVDs.

More photos are being taken than ever before, and I believe that a large
number of them will survive. But the question of whether YOUR
particular
photos will survive in digital format is uncertain.

My own solution is to do my important stuff on film. I use digital for
short-time-horizons of under 5 years. And on important digital images,
I
do
have OFOTO make prints on silver halide paper, and I keep them in
archival
albums. I have tons of CDs, with digital images on them, and I have no
reason to think that they will survive long-term. It is a pity that
this
problem has not been solved yet.





Eastman Kodak has a professional division that specializes in imaging
solutions for banks. Banks are required to maintain copies of certain types
of documents for years.

Take cancelled checks. Must be kept for 7 years, last time I looked at the
regulations. But banks do not simply scan them and store the images on
magnetic or optical media. They microfilm them. Kodak has come up with a
hybrid solution: the checks are scanned, and their images can be stored
electronically. That means that checks can be sorted by account number,
date, check number, etc. In addition, the scanned images are also printed
to microfilm and held in long-term storage. If a copy is required at some
point in the future, (even after the electronic image format is no longer
supported) it can be printed from the microfilm and can even be digitized
into whatever format is then in use.

U.S. Department of Defense requires important manuals, plans, schematics
etc. to be stored on MICROFILM, in addition to any current electronic image
standard.

Despite its shortcomings (for example, microfilm loses 10% of its image
information each time it is copied and reproduced onto new microfilm) it is
the only sure-fire method to ensure readability into the long term.

The National Archives has been experimenting with CDs that have a glass
coating--in an effort to come up with an archival-use CD.

Digital imaging makes for easy accessibility, for sure, but it does not have
archival qualities. The proverbial shoebox filled with photographs stands a
greater chance of long-term survival than does a shoebox filled with CDs.

On Thu, 23 Dec 2004 17:27:33 GMT, "Jeremy" wrote:


"timeOday" wrote in message
...

IMHO jpeg (not jpeg 2000) is perfectly safe in that regard.

WHY would you recommend a lossy format as an archival storage format?



Writable CDs have already been the
norm for about 7 years, and all new drives are backwards compatible with
them, and will be for the forseeable future.

Not according to the Luminous Landscape article on "Digital's Dirty Little
Secret." The writer cites examples of formats that were once in common use
that are now unavailable.

If that's Jim McGee's article as he
http://www.vividlight.com/articles/1513.htm
I think he's working under some false impressions.
One of the worst is where he talks about the development time and
money needed to continue to put CD reading capability into future DVD
drives. That's just wrong; the R&D's already been done. It's just a
matter of bringing *already present* technology into the new DVD
drives. This is being done now, and costs are still going down for the
new drives; obviously, including the ability to read CDs isn't the
financial burden he makes it out to be.
It's easy to predict failure, but will the failure he predicts
actually come about? I doubt it, at least not as he predicts.
Yes, there are formats that aren't being used anymore; however, there
are *years* of overlap, giving pleanty of time to do the transfer.
And he violates his own prediction, by advising the use of hard drives
as archival storage, after pointing out that he has his own hard
drives that are old technology that can't be read anymore.
In sum, he's doing nothing that others haven't done: predicting that
new technologies will come along. Well, Duh! That's called progress!
It's up to the owner of data to transfer that data to current
technology; saying that it must be done is a reason to somehow devalue
current technology (in this case, digital photography) is downright
stupid!

Responding to the rest of your post, as well, I just don't think it's
important to worry about hundreds of years.

You are stating an unqualified opinion, as though it were factual. The fact
is that countless archivists and digital libraries are struggling with this
problem, and there is no solution on the horizon. I quoted exper articles
in my previous posts, and you have just dismissed them with a wave of the
hand, and have suggested that there is no problem with archival storage with
today's media and file formats. Tell that to the Library of Congress and
they'll laugh at you.

It is irresponsible to suggest to an inquirer that he should, essentially,
"just burn it onto CD."





I disagree with the fears
of a "digital dark age." If digital information is more easily
destroyed, it is also replicated and distributed. Many images will not
survive, but billions upon billions will. Given that, it's vanity to
imagine that anybody will mourn the loss of your (or my) photographs.


--
Bill Funk
Change "g" to "a"

On Thu, 23 Dec 2004 17:27:33 GMT, "Jeremy" wrote:


"timeOday" wrote in message
...

IMHO jpeg (not jpeg 2000) is perfectly safe in that regard.

WHY would you recommend a lossy format as an archival storage format?



Writable CDs have already been the
norm for about 7 years, and all new drives are backwards compatible with
them, and will be for the forseeable future.

Not according to the Luminous Landscape article on "Digital's Dirty Little
Secret." The writer cites examples of formats that were once in common use
that are now unavailable.

If that's Jim McGee's article as he
http://www.vividlight.com/articles/1513.htm
I think he's working under some false impressions.
One of the worst is where he talks about the development time and
money needed to continue to put CD reading capability into future DVD
drives. That's just wrong; the R&D's already been done. It's just a
matter of bringing *already present* technology into the new DVD
drives. This is being done now, and costs are still going down for the
new drives; obviously, including the ability to read CDs isn't the
financial burden he makes it out to be.
It's easy to predict failure, but will the failure he predicts
actually come about? I doubt it, at least not as he predicts.
Yes, there are formats that aren't being used anymore; however, there
are *years* of overlap, giving pleanty of time to do the transfer.
And he violates his own prediction, by advising the use of hard drives
as archival storage, after pointing out that he has his own hard
drives that are old technology that can't be read anymore.
In sum, he's doing nothing that others haven't done: predicting that
new technologies will come along. Well, Duh! That's called progress!
It's up to the owner of data to transfer that data to current
technology; saying that it must be done is a reason to somehow devalue
current technology (in this case, digital photography) is downright
stupid!

Responding to the rest of your post, as well, I just don't think it's
important to worry about hundreds of years.

You are stating an unqualified opinion, as though it were factual. The fact
is that countless archivists and digital libraries are struggling with this
problem, and there is no solution on the horizon. I quoted exper articles
in my previous posts, and you have just dismissed them with a wave of the
hand, and have suggested that there is no problem with archival storage with
today's media and file formats. Tell that to the Library of Congress and
they'll laugh at you.

It is irresponsible to suggest to an inquirer that he should, essentially,
"just burn it onto CD."





I disagree with the fears
of a "digital dark age." If digital information is more easily
destroyed, it is also replicated and distributed. Many images will not
survive, but billions upon billions will. Given that, it's vanity to
imagine that anybody will mourn the loss of your (or my) photographs.


--
Bill Funk
Change "g" to "a"

Jeremy wrote:
"timeOday" wrote in message
...

IMHO jpeg (not jpeg 2000) is perfectly safe in that regard.


WHY would you recommend a lossy format as an archival storage format?


I'm saying, if you want to save some space, don't worry about jpeg going
away, because it won't.



Writable CDs have already been the

norm for about 7 years, and all new drives are backwards compatible with
them, and will be for the forseeable future.


Not according to the Luminous Landscape article on "Digital's Dirty Little
Secret." The writer cites examples of formats that were once in common use
that are now unavailable.

5.25" disks were never in widespread usage compared to CDs today.
Computers themselves weren't in widespread usage them compared to now.

Besides, things change. 20 years ago home computers couldn't even
display photorealistic images (Amiga HAM mode notwithstanding), and
there were a huge number of different manufacturers of incompatible
computers and media. The technology has matured a lot.

In the late 60s you could look back at the previous 30 years in
aerospace and honestly say that *everything* had changed. That's how
long it took to go essentially from biplanes to landing on the moon.
Now, a little over 30 years later, we're still using airplanes very
similar to the late 60s.

I cannot say for sure that's hapenning to computers, but I think it is.

After reading the "Dirty little secret" article, I realize the author
and I are looking at the same information and coming to different
conclusions. I don't dismiss the author's opinions, I'm just stating
some reasons why I think he may be mistaken on some things. On other
things, I think he's right on, for instance I would *not* have
confidence in being able to read a Microsoft Word or PowerPoint document
50 years from now. On the other hand I would be very surprised if this
usenet exchange we're having doesn't outlast both of us.



Responding to the rest of your post, as well, I just don't think it's
important to worry about hundreds of years.


You are stating an unqualified opinion, as though it were factual. The fact
is that countless archivists and digital libraries are struggling with this
problem, and there is no solution on the horizon.

Well, let me qualify my opinion then (yes, it is certainly a personal
opinion). I was talking about personal photos. If I were trying to
preserve the US Constitution or the Leaning tower of Pisa or gigabytes
of data from the Mars rovers, I agree that is a whole different
ballgame. Those artifacts are worth millions of dollars.

I quoted exper articles
in my previous posts, and you have just dismissed them with a wave of the
hand, and have suggested that there is no problem with archival storage with
today's media and file formats. Tell that to the Library of Congress and
they'll laugh at you.

It is irresponsible to suggest to an inquirer that he should, essentially,
"just burn it onto CD."



I didn't mean it is safe to just burn to a CD and leave it there
forever, only that the ubiquity of the media ensures a nice, long
transition period. I think the transition period for CDs (maybe it has
already begun) will be longer than for 3.5" disks, which was much longer
than for 5.25" disks, and so on, because computers have become so
ubiquitous, and the need for improvement is decreasing.

Here is what I do. I have two computers, and one makes nightly backups
to the other. Periodically, I copy my data to CDs. When I visit my
parents, I take a copy of my backup CDs and leave them there. I expect
to switch to DVD soon. My wife puts prints of our favorite photos into
scrapbooks - not all of them, but perhaps our favorite dozen or 20
photographs each year. As a whole, I think this system is reasonable
and I expect it to work, but my crystal ball is no better than anybody
else's.

Jeremy wrote:
"timeOday" wrote in message
...

IMHO jpeg (not jpeg 2000) is perfectly safe in that regard.


WHY would you recommend a lossy format as an archival storage format?


I'm saying, if you want to save some space, don't worry about jpeg going
away, because it won't.



Writable CDs have already been the

norm for about 7 years, and all new drives are backwards compatible with
them, and will be for the forseeable future.


Not according to the Luminous Landscape article on "Digital's Dirty Little
Secret." The writer cites examples of formats that were once in common use
that are now unavailable.

5.25" disks were never in widespread usage compared to CDs today.
Computers themselves weren't in widespread usage them compared to now.

Besides, things change. 20 years ago home computers couldn't even
display photorealistic images (Amiga HAM mode notwithstanding), and
there were a huge number of different manufacturers of incompatible
computers and media. The technology has matured a lot.

In the late 60s you could look back at the previous 30 years in
aerospace and honestly say that *everything* had changed. That's how
long it took to go essentially from biplanes to landing on the moon.
Now, a little over 30 years later, we're still using airplanes very
similar to the late 60s.

I cannot say for sure that's hapenning to computers, but I think it is.

After reading the "Dirty little secret" article, I realize the author
and I are looking at the same information and coming to different
conclusions. I don't dismiss the author's opinions, I'm just stating
some reasons why I think he may be mistaken on some things. On other
things, I think he's right on, for instance I would *not* have
confidence in being able to read a Microsoft Word or PowerPoint document
50 years from now. On the other hand I would be very surprised if this
usenet exchange we're having doesn't outlast both of us.



Responding to the rest of your post, as well, I just don't think it's
important to worry about hundreds of years.


You are stating an unqualified opinion, as though it were factual. The fact
is that countless archivists and digital libraries are struggling with this
problem, and there is no solution on the horizon.

Well, let me qualify my opinion then (yes, it is certainly a personal
opinion). I was talking about personal photos. If I were trying to
preserve the US Constitution or the Leaning tower of Pisa or gigabytes
of data from the Mars rovers, I agree that is a whole different
ballgame. Those artifacts are worth millions of dollars.

I quoted exper articles
in my previous posts, and you have just dismissed them with a wave of the
hand, and have suggested that there is no problem with archival storage with
today's media and file formats. Tell that to the Library of Congress and
they'll laugh at you.

It is irresponsible to suggest to an inquirer that he should, essentially,
"just burn it onto CD."



I didn't mean it is safe to just burn to a CD and leave it there
forever, only that the ubiquity of the media ensures a nice, long
transition period. I think the transition period for CDs (maybe it has
already begun) will be longer than for 3.5" disks, which was much longer
than for 5.25" disks, and so on, because computers have become so
ubiquitous, and the need for improvement is decreasing.

Here is what I do. I have two computers, and one makes nightly backups
to the other. Periodically, I copy my data to CDs. When I visit my
parents, I take a copy of my backup CDs and leave them there. I expect
to switch to DVD soon. My wife puts prints of our favorite photos into
scrapbooks - not all of them, but perhaps our favorite dozen or 20
photographs each year. As a whole, I think this system is reasonable
and I expect it to work, but my crystal ball is no better than anybody
else's.

"Big Bill" wrote in message
...

If that's Jim McGee's article as he
http://www.vividlight.com/articles/1513.htm

Sorry about that--you are correct, it WAS the VividLight article that I was
referring to.


I think he's working under some false impressions.
One of the worst is where he talks about the development time and
money needed to continue to put CD reading capability into future DVD
drives. That's just wrong; the R&D's already been done.

He cites a couple of examples where compatibility was maintained for a short
time as one format transitioned into another. Later, the compatibility was
withdrawn. His point was that manufacturers will make what is cheapest, and
they will not necessarily build in backward compatibility once it is
unnecessary to do so. (Remember the Canon breech mount? Or 78 RPM records?
By the late 60s, most high fidelity turntables were playing 33 and 45 only.)

The point is that we must not ASSUME that what exists now will survive well
into the future, especially if the technology improves and makes today's
technology obsolete. (I wish I could still get mercury batteries for my
Spotmatic meter. . .)

It's just a matter of bringing *already present* technology into the new DVD
drives. This is being done now, and costs are still going down for the
new drives; obviously, including the ability to read CDs isn't the
financial burden he makes it out to be.

They are compatible NOW--no contest on that point. There is no assurance
that they will be compatible 30 years from now. In fact, I'd be surprised
if DVDs still exist as they do now. The trend is to make everything
smaller. We'll probably be storing files on media no bigger than a postage
stamp in the next 20 years. Believe me, they will NOT try to make that kind
of media backward compatible with today's CDs.


It's easy to predict failure, but will the failure he predicts
actually come about? I doubt it, at least not as he predicts.

The archivist must take stock of the risks. Otherwise he runs the risk of
preserving today's information is a way that cannot be decoded easily.

There is already an obscure (but growing) field called "Digital
Archaeology." Technicians are trying to read obsolete file formats and
convert them to current ones. And we are talking about a technology that is
no more than 50 years old! If we are having these problems NOW, imagine
what it will be like in 50 more years?

Yes, there are formats that aren't being used anymore; however, there
are *years* of overlap, giving pleanty of time to do the transfer.

That is a very short time, when we are talking about a long term time
horizon. I have no doubt that big institutions will be able to decode old
files, but the typical consumer will probably just throw the showbox full of
obsolete media into the trash, rather than mess with it.

The other problem that even institutions face is how to cope with the
demands of migrating an ever-increasing amount of files. What if there is a
budget crunch? Will they continue to commit money and labor to keeping that
old stuff alive? They never really had to deal with this before--they just
housed the original books, manuscripts, photos in a building (like a
library) and it could just sit there. Perhaps they had to provide some
temperature and humidity controls (what did libraries do before they had air
conditioning? The material still managed to survive).


The fact is, if you search the literature, you will find that our most
prestigious institutions are struggling with this problem. And the amount
of digitized information continues to grow exponentially. They can't cope
with what they have now, and they will have many times more of it within
just a couple of years.

My point is that many amateur photographers are under the mistaken
impression that they are creating digital images that will last a lot longer
than did the analog prints that their parents and grandparents made. They
do not take into consideration that their work will require maintenance
(migration of file format and media format) as time progresses.

One woman in an online genealogy group boasted that she had just completed a
project of scanning all her important family historical documents--birth and
death certificates, newspaper clippings, obituaries, marriage certificates,
photographs--and she finished by saying that she had shredded and disposed
of all the paper originals. I cringed when I read that.

"Mike F" writes:

In general, I agree with what you are saying, but would
add a comment here -- when doing the "double copies"
thing, use different brands of media for the copies.

Good point. And that also guarantees you separate manufacturing
batches, which you might not be able to verify otherwise.
--
David Dyer-Bennet, , http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/
RKBA: http://noguns-nomoney.com/ http://www.dd-b.net/carry/
Pics: http://dd-b.lighthunters.net/ http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/
Dragaera/Steven Brust: http://dragaera.info/

"Jeremy" writes:

My own solution is to do my important stuff on film. I use digital
for short-time-horizons of under 5 years. And on important digital
images, I do have OFOTO make prints on silver halide paper, and I
keep them in archival albums. I have tons of CDs, with digital
images on them, and I have no reason to think that they will survive
long-term. It is a pity that this problem has not been solved yet.

Um, what do you mean by "silver halide paper"? To me that refers to
one particular approach to making silver-gelatine B&W paper. And
Ofoto offers no such service that I've ever found. They print on
ordinary chromgagenic color materials -- which have rated lives on the
order of 1/5 to 1/10 the rated lives of CD-Rs.
--
David Dyer-Bennet, , http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/
RKBA: http://noguns-nomoney.com/ http://www.dd-b.net/carry/
Pics: http://dd-b.lighthunters.net/ http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/
Dragaera/Steven Brust: http://dragaera.info/

timeOday writes:

5.25" disks were never in widespread usage compared to CDs
today. Computers themselves weren't in widespread usage them compared
to now.

True enough.

Besides, things change. 20 years ago home computers couldn't even
display photorealistic images (Amiga HAM mode notwithstanding), and
there were a huge number of different manufacturers of incompatible
computers and media. The technology has matured a lot.

Yes.

In the late 60s you could look back at the previous 30 years in
aerospace and honestly say that *everything* had changed. That's
how long it took to go essentially from biplanes to landing on the
moon. Now, a little over 30 years later, we're still using airplanes
very similar to the late 60s.

Yes and no. There are *still* people flying wood-and-fabric
airplanes, as a hobby. And there are still A&P mechanics certified to
repair them. And that's *another* 40 years down the road.

I cannot say for sure that's hapenning to computers, but I think it
is.

I think it *has*. I think CDs and jpeg and tiff and ASCII are the
"wood and fabric airplanes", though -- which look like they're going
to be supported on into the forseeable future.

After reading the "Dirty little secret" article, I realize the
author and I are looking at the same information and coming to
different conclusions. I don't dismiss the author's opinions, I'm
just stating some reasons why I think he may be mistaken on some
things. On other things, I think he's right on, for instance I
would *not* have confidence in being able to read a Microsoft Word
or PowerPoint document 50 years from now. On the other hand I would
be very surprised if this usenet exchange we're having doesn't
outlast both of us.

Absolutely agree on those two.
--
David Dyer-Bennet, , http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/
RKBA: http://noguns-nomoney.com/ http://www.dd-b.net/carry/
Pics: http://dd-b.lighthunters.net/ http://www.dd-b.net/dd-b/SnapshotAlbum/
Dragaera/Steven Brust: http://dragaera.info/