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Paper short abstract:

The paper investigates the history of microfilm as a missing link between the materiality of paper and the immateriality of the digital.

Paper long abstract:

The history of microfilm ties into the earliest and deepest imaginaries present since the invention of photography: the dream of immateriality, of 'collecting everything', and of providing access to vast archives and collections. Along the investigation of seminal projects and events between the 1920s and the 1950s (Project A, World Exhibition 1937, Emergency Program, UNESCO Mobile Microfilm Unit), this paper sheds light on the formation of transnational networks of people, companies, research and governmental institutions which propelled the idea of microfilm as a future, 'global' information technology. While the modern history of microfilm is rooted in Europe, it was developed, tested and advanced in the United States in form of large-scale copying programs for foreign manuscripts, books, newspapers, pictorial material as well as government and business data. This paper reflects on the intellectual, economic and political apparatus that was put in place to enhance the ways in which especially scientific and historical sources were shared, diffused, preserved and appropriated through photography. But while the microform (microfilm, microfiche) was established as a information and preservation technology during the 20th century, the transition to the digital medium as a further step in the dematerialisation of storage devices puts into question the longevity of data and the sustainability of media.