"The purpose of preservation is to ensure protection of information of enduring value for access by present and future generations (Conway, 1990: 206). Libraries and archives have served as the central institutional focus for preservation, and both types of institutions include preservation as one of their core functions. In recent decades, many major libraries and archives have established formal preservation programs for traditional materials which include regular allocation of resources for preservation, preventive measures to arrest deterioration of materials, remedial measures to restore the usability of selected materials, and the incorporation of preservation needs and requirements into overall program planning."
"Digital preservation raises challenges of a fundamentally different nature which are added to the problems of preserving traditional format materials. By digital preservation, I mean the planning, resource allocation, and application of preservation methods and technologies necessary to ensure that digital information of continuing value remains accessible and usable. I intentionally use the term "continuing" rather than "permanent" value to avoid both the absolutism and the idealism that the term "permanent" implies (O'Toole). My concept of digital preservation encompasses material that begins its life in digital form as well as material that is converted from traditional to digital formats.
Recording media for digital materials are vulnerable to deterioration and catastrophic loss, and even under ideal conditions they are short lived relative to traditional format materials. Although archivists have been battling acid-based papers, thermo-fax, nitrate film, and other fragile media for decades, the threat posed by magnetic and optical media is qualitatively different. They are the first reusable media and they can deteriorate rapidly, making the time frame for decisions and actions to prevent loss is a matter of years, not decades.
More insidious and challenging than media deterioration is the problem of obsolescence in retrieval and playback technologies"
The author continues on with a section on reserch and development of digital preservation formats including storage media, migration, conversion and management tools. Read more at
http://www.uky.edu/~kiernan/DL/hedstrom.html
Atlanta Foodie
8 years ago
1 comment:
There is a new company that attacks the lack of funding for preservation projects. Called ChaChing Your Media, this company has a strategic relationship with both a magnetic media restoration facility and various online media destributors. They essentially trade digital distribution rights for the preservation of audio/visual collections. Interesting idea. Interested parties can call them at:
516-874-7763
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