Journal Article The Portable Document Format (PDF): Multimedia Reviews
The shift to digital text is beginning to separate content from format. The text no longer relies on the materiality of the book, instead turning into a file accessible through multiple digital devices. Material information that used to frame our reading experience is slowly fading to the background: creases and marginalia, the traces left by use, disappear in the digital world. In the age of digital reproduction, there is no more aura: only content. Or is there? In a world of embedded metadata, weightless information, and searchable text, can we talk about unlimited reproduction? And what are the consequences? Figure 1: A PDF with bookmarks and comments ("sticky notes") (on page from Neil Levine, "Building the Unbuilt: Authenticity and the Archive," JSAH 67, no. 1 [March 2008], 14–17)
Title | |
Publication Type | Journal Article |
Year of Publication | 2011 |
Authors | León AMaría |
Journal | Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians |
Volume | 70 |
Issue | 4 |
Date Published | 12/2011 |
ISSN | 00379808 |
Abstract | The shift to digital text is beginning to separate content from format. The text no longer relies on the materiality of the book, instead turning into a file accessible through multiple digital devices. Material information that used to frame our reading experience is slowly fading to the background: creases and marginalia, the traces left by use, disappear in the digital world. In the age of digital reproduction, there is no more aura: only content. Or is there? In a world of embedded metadata, weightless information, and searchable text, can we talk about unlimited reproduction? And what are the consequences? Figure 1: A PDF with bookmarks and comments ("sticky notes") (on page from Neil Levine, "Building the Unbuilt: Authenticity and the Archive," JSAH 67, no. 1 [March 2008], 14–17) |
DOI | 10.1525/jsah.2011.70.4.532.a |