Day 293: Ring Cycle Cycle

When you work in the processing department of a library, you realize just how annoying it is when the makers of music and film decide to go all cute with their packaging. Normally, when a CD or DVD is packaged in a normal way, I just have to slap on a shelf tag and move on with my life. Not so with more elaborate packaging that cannot withstand the unwashed library patron masses.

Here's a lovely million-disc DVD set of Wagner's Ring Cycle that just arrived. And I'm going to show you all the steps I get to go through just to counteract the fanciness of the people who packaged this wonder of inefficiency.



You see, it's a cardboard sleeve with four separate disc cases in it, each holding either one or two discs.



And this is the compact, efficient, mostly patron-proof multi-disc case it has to go into.



Each of the seven discs needs to have a "donut" sticker attached, with the last three numbers of that set's barcode on it.



If you stick on enough stickers, you no longer have fingerprints. True story.



Oh, did I mention that each of the four parts comes with a booklet? Those all have to find a home in the case too.



So putting the donutted discs into the new case is easy enough. Time consuming, but no big deal.



Since the new case hold 8 discs, and I will only be putting 7 discs in it, I have to add a sticker indicating that one of the slots is intentionally blank. Otherwise there is confusion and crying.


I also need to stick a little library sticker on each booklet, so it can find its way home if it get separated.



And thanks to the innovative strategy of only numbering discs within each of the four mini-sets, I have to assign numbers so that they are all part of one big set. Go Sharpie, go!



Now all the booklets get crammed into the front of the new case.



And I get to fiddle around with it until it will close.



And this whole process gets repeated over and over again until all of Wagner's Valkyries and fat ladies in viking helmets are safely in their happy little patron-proof cages.



But I didn't even take any pictures of the really fun part. Because the box set is not the same size as the new case, new cover art has to be created, which requires scanning and moving around all the bits and pieces from all sides of the original box until it fits into the shape and space of the new case. Then that gets sent to graphics where they make color copies for the new inserts. When those are all done, they get barcoded, spine labeled, and inserted into the cases, and the world of entertainment can finally be sent on its way. The complete library processing life cycle of the Ring Cycle.

Next time you're going to buy one of those fancy CD or DVD box sets in the cute and oh-so-destructible packaging, consider checking it out from the library instead. It would be a shame for all my work to be for nothing.

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