I worked at the Library of Congress on their Digital Preservation Project, circa 2001-2003. The stated goal was to "digitize all of the Library's collections" and while most people think of books, I was in the Motion Picture Broadcast and Recorded Sound Division.

In our collection were Thomas Edison's first motion pictures, wire spool recordings from reporters at D-Day, and LPs of some of the greatest musicians of all time. And that was just our Division. Others - like American Heritage - had photos from the US Civil War and more.

Anyway, while the Rights information is one big, ugly tangled web, the other side is the hardware to read the formats. Much of the media is fragile and/or dangerous to use so you have to be exceptionally careful. Then you have to document all the settings you used because imagine that three months from now, you learn some filter you used was wrong or the hardware was misconfigured.. you need to go back and understand what was affected how.

Cool space. I wish I'd worked there longer.