Recently I was peripherally involved in the disposal of a roll
collection belonging to a deceased collector.  Featured in the
collection were quite a number of rare ragtime and blues items but
when it was suggested to the widow that these should be scanned in
order to preserve them she adamantly refused to give her permission,
despite the fact that her husband had expressed his intention of
having the whole collection digitised.  She wanted to auction the
rolls and was (for that matter, still is) convinced that scanning
would undermine the market value of the originals.

I tried my hardest to persuade her that this would not be the case,
explaining that a copy of a rare stamp or picture did not devalue the
real thing but my efforts were to no avail.  Probably these rolls will
now be purchased by a rich, acquisitive collector never to see the
light of day again, in other words they will vanish into a black hole
thus being unavailable to anyone else.  That cannot be a good thing.

John Farrell
http://homepages.tesco.net/~stridepiano/midifiles.htm