For further information,
contact Robin Dale at 650-691-2338
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RLG
2029 Stierlin Court
Suite 100
Mountain View, CA 94043
http://www.rlg.org
Saving the Present
Mountain View, Calif---September 29, 2005—-Much of the past has already
been lost to modern society—rich, cultural history obliterated by the
vicissitudes of wars, natural disasters, or simply through lack of
proper care. The celebrated collections in The Royal Library of
Alexandia were destroyed by fire. Priceless versions of The Koran were
lost forever in the lootings of Iraq's National Library in Baghdad.
Already, we have lost as many as 80 percent of the movies that were made
during the the Silent Era. Those early films were made on nitrate
negatives and most were lost before we knew of the destructive effects
of time.
Paradoxically, the computer age has not made the preservation of
cultural materials any easier. The Ivar Aasen Centre of Language and
Culture in Norway lost access to its electronic catalog of holdings
after the death of an administrator, the only individual who knew the
passwords to the system.
The fragile nature of digital media also presents special problems—a
recent report estimated the longevity of CDs and DVDs at between 20 and
200 years, a small fraction of the thousands of years that printed
manuscripts have survived.
Robin Dale, a program officer for RLG, a Mountain View, California
organization dedicated to addressing the problems of saving and
preserving digital information, says, "People assume that digital
materials can be preserved forever and yet, that just isn't true."
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Dale/Page Two
Dale notes that many times data is lost due to corrupt computer files
or made inaccessible because the file was created in a program no longer
available. In some cases, files have been stored on media for which the
computers no longer have the drives to read them.
According to Dale, many of RLG's initiatives focus on standardizing
methods of collecting and storing materials so that these cultural
resources will survive for future generations. Says Dale, "The 1960
census was often cited as having been lost, but in reality, the
information was just not accessible because we lacked the hardware and
software to access the disks where the information was saved."
One of RLG's latest efforts has been to help develop "An Audit
Checklist for the Certification of Digital Repositories." These
repositories are the institutions that store and maintain digital
collections. A joint effort between RLG and NARA (the National
Archives and Records Administration), the checklist provides criteria
for evaluating digital warehouses and will be used in certifying
repositories in the future.
These guidelines are enormously important for universities and other
institutions who currently take precautions against natural disasters
and other mishaps but don't have reliable criteria for evaluating
digital repositories. The issues covered by the checklist include
guidelines for detecting data corruption and loss.
Certified repositories are also required to plan for natural disasters,
such as Katrina, and to maintain proper climatic controls. For
information about future steps and related projects, please see
http://www.rlg.org/en/page.php?Page_ID=580.
Says Dale, "The repositories are the guardians of our own history.
RLG's work is to ensure that digital records will be preserved for
generations to come."
# # # # #
About RLG
Founded in 1974 by The New York Public Library and Columbia, Harvard,
and Yale universities, RLG provides solutions to the challenges
presented by information access and management in the digital era. A
not-for-profit organization, headquartered in Mountain View, California,
RLG is composed of over 150 international research libraries, archives,
museums, and other cultural memory institutions. RLG's global
membership has remarkable collections for research and learning. For
more information, please see http://www.rlg.org.
Maggie Jones
Executive Secretary
Digital Preservation Coalition
Innovation Centre
York Science Park
Heslington
YO10 5DG
e: [log in to unmask]
t: +44 (0) 1904 435 362
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