Digital Preservation Coalition

JISC, the Digital Preservation Coalition, Portico and the University of London Computer Centre are pleased to announce the release of a new report investigating long term access to digitised collections.

The digital universe grew by 62% in 2009, but those adding to these resources need to think long term if they want to make best use of their public funding. Clearly stated preservation policies are essential in guaranteeing that researchers in the future will be able to access and use a digital resource, according to a new report funded by JISC. But the responsibility needs to be shared between funders, who must articulate the need for data curation, and universities, who need to implement a preservation policy for each digital collection.

The advice comes as the government announces a new 'right to data' so that government-held datasets can be requested and used by the public, and then published on a regular basis.

JISC has invested more than £20 million in the last five years so that students and researchers can have instant and flexible access to a range of the UK's most important archival collections. 

Alastair Dunning, programme manager at JISC, said: “Although our initial goal was to examine our own projects, the recommendations and outcomes are relevant to funders and projects in many different sectors.”

Dr William Kilbride, Executive Director of the Digital Preservation Coalition, said: “JISC challenged us to work in fine detail and in broad strokes at the same time. We immersed ourselves in the detail of sixteen different projects with a brief to support these projects and use that experience for a strategic and lasting contribution based on hard empirical evidence.”

The results of this work published today contain recommendations for institutions, funders and those assessing funding projects and programmes.  The authors anticipate that the template used to survey the projects could also form a useful blueprint for funders and assessors in the future.

• Full text of the report and recommendations.
• Digital Preservation Case Notes
• JISC Digitisation Programme
• Portico
• ULCC