On Mon, 6 Mar 2006, George Macgregor wrote:

> it... seems to make little sense to go to the effort of making
> information accessible NOW when it could theoretically be inaccessible
> 24 hours from NOW or even 3 years from NOW...

Please refer to Steve Hitchcock's posting about PRESERV. 

http://listserver.sigmaxi.org/sc/wa.exe?A2=ind06&L=american-scientist-open-access-forum&D=1&O=D&F=l&P=14808

As I said from the outset, Eprints and OA are of course (quite naturally
and without fanfare) attending to small-p preservation (as has Arxiv,
since its inception in 1991, and CogPrints since its inception in 1997
-- note that all their contents are still here, with us, in 2006, in
continuous use, again without any fanfare about large-P Preservation).
But Preservation is not why they were self-archived!

The point is simple: Preservation is *not* the reason researchers
self-archive their postprints, which are final, refereed drafts of 
their published articles. Maximising their accessibility and their
impact is the reason researchers self-archive their postprints. It
is not those self-archived supplements that require the large-P
Preservation, it is the published originals.

If researchers self-archive at all, they do not do it in order to Preserve
their articles; they do it in order to increase their article's usage
and impact. And only 15% of researchers as yet self-archive. The goal
of OA is to raise that to 15% to 100%. Neither the silly suggestion that
authors should self-archive in order to Preserve their articles -- nor any
extra work or complications anyone foolishly adds to the self-archiving
procedure (such as it is, for example, in Eprints IRs today) in the
interests of Preservation -- will do anything to help raise that 15%
to 100%: On the contrary, a bad reason for self-archiving and needless
extra work in self-archiving will only deter self-archiving. And neglect
of OA for other archiving priorities (e.g., Digital Preservation) are
the worst.

At the same time, articles in OA IRs *are* being small-p preserved, as
noted.  So that's not a substantive issue either.

The only substantive issue is how to fill OA IRs with 100% of
institutional OA article output, as soon as possible. (It's already
vastly overdue and substantial research impact and progress continue
to be needlessly lost till it happens.)

I have listed many heroic librarians who understand this fully, and
have been at the forefront of OA efforts and success (e.g., Paula
Callan, Helene Bosc, Eloy Rodrigues, Derek Law, Susanna Mornati,
and many, many others). But there are also many in the library community
who are ignorant of or indifferent to OA, and have other ideas about
what to do with IRs. Several are discussed in Richard Poynder's 
insightful analysis.  And it is a parting of ways with them that
Richard was proposing to the OA movement (and he may well be right).

http://poynder.blogspot.com/2006/03/institutional-repositories-and-little.html

Stevan Harnad

On Mon, 6 Mar 2006, George Macgregor wrote:

> Hi John,
> 
> > All this has nothing to do with making
> > information accessible NOW. You have failed to distinguish between present
> > and future accessibility.
> 
> The point I was making is that the differentiation between 'present' and
> 'future' accessibility is bogus - there no longer is any real difference.
> And if there is no longer a difference, then the proponents of present
> accessibility should probably be considering future accessibility as a
> matter of course.  
> 
> I'm sure most will continue to treat such matters as 'a horses for courses'
> situation, like you say.  However, it just seems to make little sense to go
> to the effort of making information accessible NOW when it could
> theoretically be inaccessible 24 hours from NOW or even 3 years from NOW -
> and when some simple technical and administrative measures could have been
> taken to prevent any consequent inaccessibility.  It is also appears to be
> inconsistent with Stevan Harnad's definition of 'immediate access', which
> suggests that information be accessible "today, tomorrow and into the
> future". 
> 
> Regards,
> 
> George  
> 
> ----------------------------------------------
> George Macgregor,
> Centre for Digital Library Research (CDLR),
> Department of Computer & Information Sciences,
> University of Strathclyde, Livingstone Tower,
> 26 Richmond Street, Glasgow, UK, G1 1XH
> tel: +44 (0)141 548 4753
> fax: +44 (0)141 548 4523
> web: http://cdlr.strath.ac.uk/ 
> --------------------------------------------
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: J.W.T.Smith [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> > Sent: 03 March 2006 17:29
> > To: George Macgregor
> > Cc: [log in to unmask]
> > Subject: Re: preservation vs. Preservation
> > 
> > 
> > George,
> > 
> > Comments below.
> > 
> > On Fri, 3 Mar 2006, George Macgregor wrote:
> > 
> > > John,
> > >
> > > > Preservation and access are two different things.
> > >
> > > I have to disagree.  Preservation is inextricably linked with access.
> > >
> > > To state that 'preservation and access are two totally different things'
> > is
> > > - I find - a common misconception.
> > 
> > I don't suffer from common misconceptions, but I am sometimes
> > misunderstood.
> > 
> > > Preservation (with a capital P) is not
> > > merely about preserving digital objects for posterity as an end in
> > itself
> > > (which is, of course, important); it is about preserving the digital
> > > integrity of the object(s) so as to ensure it remains *accessible* ad
> > > infinitum.
> > >
> > > Robust Preservation strategies always ensure sufficient administrative
> > > metadata (technical metadata, rights metadata, etc.) is recorded because
> > > without it, user access can theoretically be jeopardised at *any* point
> > in
> > > the future.  The rate of technical and software obsolesce is such that
> > > deposits made to IRs today could - theoretically - be inaccessible in
> > five
> > > years.  Preservation is no longer some triviality that can be addressed
> > far,
> > > far in the future my 'someone else'.  IR administrators / libraries have
> > to
> > > be in a position to regularly migrate or refresh materials to preserve
> > > continued user access.  Their ability to do so is predicated on
> > preparing
> > > suitable Preservation strategies.
> > >
> > > Thus, to suggest that Preservation entails 'limiting' or 'screening'
> > access
> > > is - in my opinion - to entirely misinterpret the purpose of digital
> > > preservation.  If efforts at attaining '100% OA via 100% self-archiving'
> > are
> > > not to be in vain, the need for Preservation (with a capital P!) should
> > not
> > > be pooh-poohed.
> > 
> > I did not "pooh-pooh" anything. What you say is true but it is not
> > relevant to what I wrote. All this has nothing to do with making
> > information accessible NOW. You have failed to distinguish between present
> > and future accessibility.
> > 
> > To clarify, for the here and now, I believe Preservation is not the same
> > thing as making accessible and those whose main interest is accessibility
> > NOW should not spend too much time on worrying about Preservation. Now [at
> > this time, currently] PDF is an excellent way of making information
> > available, but I would not suggest it as a preservation format. Since
> > there has been a prevalence for poor quality metaphors/analogies in this
> > discussion I could say this is a horses for courses situation.
> > 
> > Regards,
> > 
> > John Smith.
>