One of the most useful cooperative efforts of the International Federation of Film Archives is the Periodical Indexing Project (PIP) started in 1972 by Karen Jones and the FIAF Documentation Commission with the help of many archives all over the world. Starting from the insight that around 100 archives were indexing for their libraries the same periodicals, it was advisable to do this work cooperatively and compile and edit the result in one place.
A Work of Love
A microfiche edition has been produced quarterly, as well as a yearbook. The PIP project is now led by Michael Moulds in London, who had taken over from Karen Jones. With only one assistant, a tiny and always underpowered computer-system and a simple database but endless patience, devotion and enthusiasm, Michael Moulds and his one-person staff has published the International Film Archive CD-Rom, which comprises now in its last edition of spring 1994 detailed information on 170 film- and tv-periodicals (of which a few are inactive by now) from the period of 1984 to the beginning of 1994.
Immediate Success
The CD-Rom has been an immediate success because it is so much easier to handle than the relatively cumbersome microfiches. The user interface and the database on the CD-Rom has been developed by Mike Peterson of the Open University. He has programmed "The Guardian", "The Sunday Times" and "The Times" CD-Rom interfaces. Mike Peterson has made very practical extensions for FIAF to his original design. It runs under DOS and is of high stability.
Time runs out for microfiches
Not only is the access to microfiches time-consuming; it is also confined to an unchangeable fixed order, e.g. film titles, subject headings and biographies. The database of the CD-Rom enables a free text search, and the user may also ask for biographies, film directors, general subjects, authors, film/tv-periodicals (from 1984 to early 1994) and individual films. The database has been enriched by a list of indexed Periodicals, a FIAF Members Directory and a Bibliography of FIAF Members Publications (1985-92).
Highlights of the next edition
In November of this year the fall edition is due to be published and will enlarge the indexed period from 1983 to fall 1994. There will also be a Directory of Film and TV documentation collections as published by FIAF.
12.000 Treasures of the Archives
As a special treat the 1995 CD-Rom will include the valuable information of the FIAF short film catalogue comprising 12.000 titles, now named "Treasures of the Archives", updating the work of the late Jay Leyda ("Embryo"). Future editions will enlarge the indexed period by four years, then covering the seventeen years from 1979 to 1995.
A trick for busy archivists
The FIAF CD-Rom, a truly non-commercial venture
Michael Moulds and his collaborator(s) were working with admirable precision and with high professionalism and the FIAF Documentation Commission can be really proud of this work, which is of such great value to anybody working with film and television.
Peter Konlechner
There is no excuse these days not to have a CD-Rom.
CD-Rom drives are very cheap and will cost you 200 to 600 dollars at the most. They are also quicker now and you can buy them with average access times of about 150-180ms.
You can easily copy the CD-Rom in a sub-directory on your hard disc. (At present, a space of 85MB is necessary). This trick speeds up the average access time by a factor of 20 (about 9ms).
The pricing of the disk and its updates is very competitive. The updates are now published only twice a year in spring and autumn; this should be increased to a quarterly interval.
Oesterreichisches Filmmuseum, Wien.