> Am I the only person on this list that considers signatures to be a
> quaint but effectively meaningless anachronism?
>
> To illustrate my point, try this experiment: Next time you're in a
> restaurant paying for a meal by credit card*, ask one of your dining
> companions to sign the bill with an unintelligible squiggly line, and
> see if either the waiter or the credit card company queries
> the transaction.
Isn't that just down to incompetence? Do you have any more faith in chip and pin?
Actually, my point was that if a register is to be the definitive record of acquisitions then it needs to be as fake-proof as possible. Our 19th C hand-written registers have a certain quality that would be difficult to forge if one was so minded to replace all the records for gold coins with ones for copper for example to hide the nice little side-line in bullion dealing you've had going for years. With a computer printout things are a little different: I can easily make another just the same (with the necessary amendments to cover my tracks), bind it up nicely and who would know?
> Has anyone considered Computer-Output Microfilm (COM) an alternative
> approach to producing an archival-quality hard-copy accession
> register?
Am I the only person on this list that hates, loathes and despises microfilm/fiche? It might be archival, but it is absolutely appalling to use! (I say this from bitter experience...)
Mick
Michael P. Cooper
Nottingham Museums Registrar
tel.: +44 (0)115 915 3671
fax : +44 (0)115 915 3601
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