Category Archives: Digital preservation

Whose Responsibility is Web Resource Preservation?

It is possible that one of the reason why so little is being done about Web resource preservation is that everybody feels it is somebody else’s responsibility. It might be very easy for us all to avoid the issue by standing back and waiting for someone else to tackle what, we have already explained, is a very complex problem. However taking this approach may mean that nobody does anything and we all lose out.

So whose responsibility is Web resource preservation then?

There are a number of parties who may have an interest in the preservation of Web resource. These range from the international institutions down to the individual.

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Digital preservation in a nutshell (Part I)

One of the goals of PoWR is to make current trends in digital preservation meaningful and relevant to information professionals with the day-to-day responsibility for looking after web resources. Anyone coming for the first time to the field of digital preservation can find it a daunting area, with very distinct terminology and concepts. Some of these are drawn from time-honored approaches to managing things like government records or institutional archives, while others have been developed exclusively in the digital domain. It is an emerging and evolving field that can take some time to get your head round: so we thought it was a good idea to offer a series of brief primers.

Starting, naturally, with digital preservation: this is defined as a “series of managed activities necessary to ensure continued access to digital materials for as long as necessary” (Digital Preservation Coalition, 2002). Continue reading →