And we continue with another session on harvesting approaches for Web content archiving and preservation. We begin with Martha Anderson from the Office of Strategic Initiatives at the Library of Congress. Its problems are probably larger than those of most other libraries - there is no clearly defined country domain, and the volume of material is of course significantly higher than in most other countries.
The library therefore takes a thematic approach to its collection - both identifying ongoing themes and time-bounded issues (elections, the 11 September attacks, etc.). The goal of such selection is to save as much as possible with limited resources, and preserving the context of content as much as this can be achieved. At this point, the LoC is required to seek permission to display and (in the case of event-based harvest) to collect. In doing so, it attempts to leverage its institutional resources to achieve a higher volume of coverage.