It's sad that the BBC had sufficient rights that they could sell the tapes outright but didn't feel any compulsion to simply make the films available themselves. How many other such gems are rotting in thier archives?
It's also strange that Gates had to buy the tapes at all. I would have assumed that the BBC had an ongoing digitization program to make material languishing in their archives freely available, and that anyone who wanted to speed a particular video through the process could simply donate the costs plus a little extra. That would have been a lot simpler for Bill Gates than buying the rights and handling everything himself, so I guess there is no such program.
Or, on the other hand, maybe there was no practical reason for buying the rights. Maybe Bill Gates bought the rights as an IP art collector, like someone who buys a Picasso just for the pride of owning it.
