Blog

Roxana Popistasu is Digital Preservation Coordinator at Bibliothèque nationale de Luxembourg 

“In digital preservation, identification of digital content is essential”, say A. Dappert and A. Farquhar in their iPRES 2017 article Permanence of the Scholarly Record: Persistent Identification and Digital Preservation – A Roadmap. The same idea appeared in the introduction of Robert E. Kahn’s keynote at iPRES 2016:

https://twitter.com/RoxPoNinja/status/782850754059132929

At the National Library of Luxembourg (BnL), we agree unequivocally: we cannot preserve and provide access to our national heritage without taking into account the reliable and sustainable identification of our digital resources. But how do we do that? What is the “best” persistent identifier (PID) system? Are there best practices when it comes to persistent identification? These are some of the questions we set out to answer at the start of our journey into finding the right PID system.

Patricia Sleeman is Archivist (Electronic) at UNHCR in Geneva, Switzerland

Tiffany Chung’s reconstructing an exodus history: boat trajectories in Asia, 2017

To be a digital archivist in UNHCR is interesting, challenging and inspiring all at once. To be part of an organization whose staff are often at the coalface of conflicts and operations which are concurrently taking place all over our world, witnessing the misery of displaced people is a unique experience. A privileged one. 

Michelle Lindlar is Digital Preservation Team Leader at Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB) in Germany

It seems that most of us are well into the commitment stage of our relationship with digital preservation – it’s no longer a task tucked away in exclusive projects which only few institutions can participate in, but has growing acceptance as an institution’s core function. Or, to put it in the words of William Kilbride himself in reflecting on last year’s WDPD: “we have learned that it’s not about delaying the digital dark age: it’s about coming good on the digital promise”.

Background

Within the Netherlands there are several archives with sheetmusic. There is not a national organization which covers those archives. Due to financial problems in 2013, all these archives were closed for public and their collections were no longer available. The largest collection is at the Stichting Omroep Muziek ((SOM) Dutch Broadcast Music), which has about 650,000 titles, classical music as well as popular music, salon music and, the unique part, the music which was specifically composed or arranged for the national radio and television broadcasts from 1920 until 1980 (180,000 titles).

Fiona Hyslop is Cabinet Secretary for Culture, Tourism and External Affairs within the Scottish Government

On World Digital Preservation Day, I’d like to reflect on Scotland’s long tradition of preserving its documentary heritage and showcase how Scotland is helping to lead in the global challenge digital preservation.

This tradition dates back to 1286 to the first reference of a Scottish Government official William of Dumfries who had the responsibility of looking after records. This responsibility eventually evolved into the current role of Keeper of the Records of Scotland that we have today. To store our national archives General Register House was built in the 18^th century, it is one of the oldest custom built archive buildings in the world still in use for its original purpose, and is home to National Records of Scotland which is responsible for Scotland’s national archive, as well as the registration of vital events and the taking of the 10 yearly national census.

A new day is dawning on this part of planet earth… but this day is like no other, this day is special, this day is all about digital preservation and this day is ours!

via GIPHY

Ok, that sounded a bit full on and slightly arch-baddy, but it’s actually ALL good. All of it!

Mariella Guercio is President of ANAI (Italian National Association of Archivists)

In the past few years, many initiatives have been developed to support or promote digital preservation infrastructures, specifically with reference to the quality of the repositories and to the definition of standards for interoperability. This might seem a promising opportunity for making concrete experiences and implementing technical solutions, but I think that the professionals in the preservation sector (mainly archivists and digital curators) should monitor very carefully these initiatives on digital preservation (for example, the ETSI draft for defining  policy and security requirements for trust service providers offering long-term preservation of digital signatures; and – even more -  the standard ISO 17068 “Information and documentation — Trusted third party repository for digital records,” with its narrow and limited definition of authenticity), for many reasons.

Marcel Ras is Digital Preservation Manager for the Dutch Digital Heritage Network

It is almost 20 years ago that the pioneering publications on Digital Preservation were issued by initiative of the KB, the Dutch National Library. The NEDLIB papers described technical challenges and solutions for digital preservation. Preserving digital information was a very different job at the turn of the Century. The challenges with digital preservation were mainly framed in technical terms, as the NEDLIB papers showed us. With the turn of the century also came the millennium bug and the dooms of the “digital dark age”. Gloomy predictions adding some state of urgency and awareness to our work and the profession of digital preservation.

Lourdes Fuentes-Hashimoto is Archivist for Total in Paris, France

When you hear the word “obsolescence” what do you spontaneously think about? I asked the question to a dozen random coworkers, who are neither archivists nor digital preservation specialists. The majority immediately think of planned or built-in obsolescence, that is to say the fact of designing something with an artificially limited useful life so it become quickly unfunctional or unusable. They mentioned “my washing machine” or “my smartphone” as examples. Other colleagues’ quick-fire answer was “something being out of date” or “outmoded” and consequently useless.

Kelly Merks works at the Expatriate Archive Centre in the Hague, Netherlands

The Expatriate Archive Centre (EAC) is an independent non-profit foundation. We aim to collect and preserve expatriate life stories, regardless of a person’s country of origin or where they moved to. Our focus is primarily on unique personal writings. Though much of our collection is tangible — including photographs, letters, diaries and other documents — in recent years we have begun to collect born-digital material.