1:30 PM – 2:15 PM (PDT) |  Friday 4 September 2020 – 3:30 pm to 4:15 pm central

Panel Description: This panel will talk about the people who are currently archiving anime fandom history as well as offer you resources so you can contribute. Let’s preserve as much as we can! Featuring: Lance Heiskell | Room: YUZU STAGE

By: Jenna Morgan | @jkmorgan-media​

The grind is real with this guy! Imagine playing an MMO like Runescape and chopping up the same oak tree to level up, believing that one day you’ll earn money doing this. You chop the same Runescape oak tree every day for years before you actually do. It doesn’t get any harder, it’s a thankless job that no one seems to understand. But eventually you DO earn money and your passion for chopping these easy tedious trees becomes profitable. Idk, you open a shop or something and there becomes some tree shortage or something. The metaphor kinda ends there. The point? THE GRIND.

I’m sure many people found his work for archiving older anime media (such as comics, magazines, videos, interviews, conventions, and more) unimportant, or even a waste of his time, not understanding the importance of his work… Obviously *he* saw the importance of preserving these pieces of work; it’s art and history. Museums preserve items and devices, maybe even a reconstructed figure to represent what once was, so what would the digital version of this be?

Answer: Media archeology. That is both a broad and narrow subject. Most probably wouldn’t be interested in obsolete communication devices or old metal cylinders that were one of the first to record sound on, but this idea proceeds old, outdated physical items. Online this idea has branched out into different subcategories and different websites with similar information but differently mapped out for different uses.

Anyone who has looked up royalty free music for independent work or anyone who needs copyright safe videos on the Internet Media Archive knows the importance of this. Those who don’t, think of school and doing research projects. Did you ever research something and think that they didn’t really focus on your selected project subject when choosing books for the library, or wonder if the teacher hates you for giving you such an impossible assignment? Well, it may be lack of funding from the school, or the teacher is making a point about research and history. You have to deep dive half the time to find older media that isn’t mainstream. I’m sure Robotech is somewhere to stream but it’s not exactly on Netflix on the homepage, is it? Production studios have a research department that would be the paper form of what he does but it’s not available to anyone that isn’t willing to pay and be there in person. This way, anyone who is interested in the subject or needs/wants the archived media can do so with free range and have the freedom to use it for their own personal work (as long as they follow other guidelines of course). Working within the same system (the internet) for years, he has become familiar with many sites that post archived anime media that he not only benefits from but supports on his website!

He may have made it seem like a very simple system and not that impressive while talking about it on the panel (it honestly was hard to listen to him not being very enthusiastic about his work for awhile), but his work speaks for itself on exactly how passionate he is. If you have a chance to check out his website (https://www.animenostalgiabomb.com), it’s coo-coo-crazy-bananas, so enjoy! Maybe find your new obsession.