Technology - Digital Preservation Coalition

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Any factor relating to the integrity and operation of the systems, storage, hardware or software required to preserve digital materials.

What are the Risks of not preserving digital materials?

Organization Type	Risk	Potential Consequences
All organizations	Technologies used become obsolete; this may apply to elements such as hardware, software and file formats.	Unable to provide access to digital objects Required to maintain expensive legacy systems Disruption of business/organisation’s functions Unable to provide audit trails Unable to meet legal/regulatory requirements
All organizations	Rate of data creation outstrips capacity for storage, processing and preservation.	Important digital objects are not captured within the preservation system Data loss/corruption
All organizations	Insufficient funding available to allow sustainable preservation procedures and systems to be established.	Data loss/corruption Unable to carry out necessary preservation actions Unable to provide access to digital objects Unable to meet legal/regulatory requirements
Archives	Failure to maintain preservation system and processes.	Preservation system/processes become redundant/ineffectual Data loss/corruption Unable to provide access to digital objects High cost of replacing/extracting data from outdated systems
Higher Education and Research	The hardware or software required to interpret, and present digital information is no longer available	Unable to provide access to information required to support organizational processes Disruption of organization’s functions Increased costs now and in the future
Libraries	Storage conditions are inadequate for preservation	Data loss/corruption Disruption of organisation’s functions Confidence loss Damage to reputation
Libraries	Do not adequately consider the preservation needs of complex digital objects, including new publication formats	Data generated by the cultural and creative industries will be lost or inaccessible Loss of context/documentation Loss of reputation Loss of funding

What Opportunities do preserved digital materials create?

Organization Type	Digital Preservation can…
All organizations	provide efficiencies of scale through shared services, resources and systems
All organizations	provide cost efficiencies through planned disposal and deletion which results in reduced storage requirements
All organizations	provide cost and operational efficiencies by allowing the consolidation of legacy systems
All organizations	provide cost efficiencies through the greater automation of processes
Business	provide cost efficiencies through planned disposal and deletion according to specified retention schedules, which results in reduced storage requirements
Higher Education and Research	create a pathway for smaller organizations to take advantage of enterprise level infrastructure through shared or cloud services
Higher Education and Research	reduce duplication of infrastructure and effort by sharing services, systems and storage with other institutions
Higher Education and Research	make the right information is available at the right time, by using the most appropriate service
Higher Education and Research	avoid wasted expenditure and reduce long-term operational costs by considering access and reuse at the stage of data generation, creation and system design.
Higher Education and Research	enable informed and planned disposal as well as retention which mitigates the continuous increase in the volume of time-series data, as well as the cost of managing it
Museums and Galleries	cut the costs of viewing rooms open to the public by moving some collections into deep storage

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