Back to the Big Picture

The next session is chaired by Alex Byrne, the president-elect of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions. His role here is to frame the next session which will present some responses from cultural institutions to the problems raised today. IFLA itself is interested in forging partnerships involved in the preservation of networked resources. Let's see how long my battery lasts through his and the following talks.

Jim Michalko, President of the Research Libraries Group, is the first speaker. He notes that what's available on the Web now are the current and future materials of research, and it is necessary to make and keep this material available through preservation and archiving mechanisms. Collective action is the appropriate way forward to achieve this, and he notes that the NLA has taken some very useful steps which should be taken up far more widely than they have.

Jim's overarching observation from the day is that we're still at a very early phase of Web development, even these some ten years down the track from its emergence. This means that it is still well within archivists' possibilities to develop effective systems aiming to preserve digital resources, and conferences such as this one are important and timely in this respect. He describes that there are four issue clusters in this development process:

• similarities
  • with analog approaches
  • with past practices
  • with other digital efforts
• selection
  • taking an overt responsibility for selection actions
  • coordination of what institution is responsible for what resources
  • developing a comprehensive mission
• system
  • need for a high-level services framework
  • design of information services
• sustainability
  • costs of the effort
  • subsidy from governmental and other partners
  • expectations of various stakeholders
  • organisational design

He suggests that a fairly generic product development process should actually apply here.

Up next is Caroline Wiegandt, speaking on the International Internet Preservation Consortium. My battery will run out soon, but then I've already pointed to the IIPC a few times on this blog...