I do absolutely love the digital presences of the New York Public Library!

With funding from the the The Metropolitan New York Library Council, NYPL plans to digitize their audio collection from their public educational program series. From the start of the series in 1983 NYPL has featured  “contemporary writers, artists, academics, critics and intellectuals currently working in the United States and abroad and given them a forum in which to explore ideas, new and old, in lectures, interviews, and conversations.” There are over 1,200 recordings on a “variety of media in analog format”.

Realizing the public appeal of these recordings, NYPL has chosen 24-hours of the best of the best of the recorded series. Their goal is to put the finished digitized recordings on the Library’s website–” to ensure broad access to local, national and international audiences and as an effort to preserve their original intellectual content ”

So far NYPL has seven recording featured on their site, including this one featuring Wynton Marsalis and hopefully Jay-Z will soon become preserved for the masses for the long run in NYPL’s 24 Hours of Public Programs.

Look forward to hearing Isaac Asimov, Umberto Eco, Henry Louis Gates, Tom Stoppard and Joyce Carol Oates.