Media Mutations: Conference Proceedings
Unlocking Television Archives in the Digital Era
Media Mutations Publishing
edited by Luca Barra, Susanne Eichner, Matteo Marinello, Emiliano Rossi and Anne-Katrin Weber
The volume is fully open access and downloadable here
Unlocking Television Archives in the Digital Era is the proceedings volume of the 16th Media Mutations Conference, held at the University of Bologna (26–27 May 2025). The collection addresses the complex negotiations between technology and memory that characterize archive use in an age of multi-channel distribution and digital platforms. Contributors examine how digitisation, recovery, access, and sharing have reshaped the relationship between media institutions and their audiovisual heritage, while also raising urgent questions about fair use, sustainability, and the distribution of archival resources across public broadcasters, commercial networks, and local channels. Developed in dialogue with the research project ATLas – Atlante delle Televisioni Locali, the volume pays attention to lesser-known archival experiences and adopts a transnational perspective that moves beyond Eurocentric frameworks. Topics range from local Italian broadcasting history and AI-driven recontextualization of archival content, to decolonial approaches to audiovisual heritage, pirate care and shadow libraries, true crime television, and the role of archives in strengthening public broadcasters' streaming strategies.
Table of Content
Luca Barra, Susanne Eichner, Matteo Marinello, Emiliano Rossi, Anne-Katrin Weber
Making Sense (and Value) of Television Archives
What to Do about Taste-less Transmissions? Useful Television Histories
A Tale of Two Archives. National Ideal vs. Local Reality
Giulia Crisanti, Damiano Garofalo
Pannella & Pallone. TeleRoma56’s Glocal Broadcasting between Politics and Entertainment
Bringing the Nation to the "Provincia". Promotional Strategies and Entertainment on TeleSanterno
Mapping the Legacy of Audiovisual Archives. The Sardinian Case
Collaborative Practices and Fair Research Uses of Television Archives
Redundances and Stereotypes. Does the Archival Reuse Reinforce the Lack of Diversity?
AI Blob! LLM-Driven Recontextualization of Italian Television Archives
Neck-Deep in Digital Oil? Public Broadcasters’ Archives as AI Training Datasets
Folk-archiving Minor Audiovisual Contents. Television Programs, Pirate Care and Shadow Libraries
Archiving Television and Celebrating Legacy. Mike Bongiorno’s Centenary Exhibition and TV Miniseries
Tamara Antona Jimeno, Ignacio Nevado
Decolonising the Archive. Rethinking Audiovisual Heritage in the ERT Collection
Alessia Francesca Casiraghi, Diletta Cenni
An Archive Utopia. Attempts and illusions of the Studio Portals Catalogues
Preserving Regional Television History. The NBN Television Archive Project