ARCHIVE SELECTION COMMITTEES: WIPING OF AUDIOVISUAL NATIONAL HISTORY?

Biography of the Norwegian journalist, artist, author, film actor, folk singer and above all: Radio and television reporter and producer Erik Bye has been read and evaluated. Erik Erikssønn Bye was famous in Norway. He was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1926 and died in Norway in 2004.The biography of Erik Bye was released in 2017. The book consists of 525 pages to read. But to those of you who worked him in The Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK), could have added more pages because he was more that great – he was a national giant!

ERIK BYE WIPED?

Even if my work for the NRK was to take care of the Television archive, I had to administrate the Archive Selection Committee. Appointed members from the different producing departments were members of the committee. We had to make a selection of the future of every transmitted television programme: The life or death of the programmes. Programmes made on films were kept without any evaluation but programmes made on tapes had to be evaluated. We decided to wipe a lot of programmes. Gradually I got a feeling that we made a great mistake wiping transmitted television programmes. The visual national history was important to keep.

Reading the biography of Erik Bye I was reminded about the conflict of the work of the committee. We had decided to wipe the only copy of two of the programmes made by Erik Bye.

“ Lys i vandal natt “ was the Norwegian title of a programme about the Norwegian poet Hans Børli. Due to the fact that the programme got negative critique, the committee wiped the only cope of the programme made. The main reason for the wiping was that Nrk needed to reuse the tape for a new production.

With reference to the Archive Committee a programme about Ingolf Hansen was wiped. The title of the programme was: “ Om gutten som gjemte seg i tårnet”. The programme was a story about a boy who suffered from brain damage. He was 28 years of age.

We decided to close the committee after a proposal from me. The result was that we kept all television programmes transmitted. Wiping of information give to the population of Norway could be regarded as a hidden policy of censorship. I was happy when the work of the committee was finished.

Sorry about Erik Bye and two of his splendid productions.

Recommendation to all broadcasting companies worldwide: Close your selection committee at once.