NET EFFECTS: How Librarians Can Manage the Unintended Consequences of the Internet Edited by Marylaine Block

Chapter Nine: How Librarians Can Manage the Challenge of Disappearing Digital Data

Disaster and Recovery Planning

• Emergency Management Guide for Business & Industry http://www.fema.gov/library/bizindex.shtm
  "A step-by-step approach to emergency planning, response and recovery for companies of all sizes. Sponsored by a Public-Private Partnership with the Federal Emergency Management Agency."

• LOCKSS http://lockss.stanford.edu
  "The LOCKSS model, 'Lots of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe,' creates low-cost, persistent digital 'caches' of authoritative versions of http-delivered content. The LOCKSS software enables institutions to locally collect, store, preserve and archive authorized content, thus safeguarding their community's access to that content." [For more info, see this article: "Diffused Knowledge Immortalizes Itself: the LOCKSS program." http://library.cern.ch/HEPLW/7/papers/1/]

• Tech Note: Disaster Planning for Computers and Networks http://www.ala.org/Content/NavigationMenu/PLA/Publications_and_Reports/Tech_Notes/Disaster_Planning.htm
  
  
  

  Digital Preservation and Standards

• ARL 223: the Case for Institutional Repositories http://www.arl.org/newsltr/223/instrepo.html
  The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) advocates more repositories like MIT's DSpace.

• Conservation Online http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/
  "a full text library of conservation information, covering a wide spectrum of topics of interest to those involved with the conservation of library, archives and museum materials. Topics include digital archives and disaster planning.

• Council on Library Information and Resources (CLIR) http://www.clir.org/
  CLIR is working with the Library of Congress on a national strategy for digital preservation.

• Digital Library Federation http://www.clir.org/diglib/dlfhomepage.htm
  Its mission is "identifying standards and "best practices" for digital collections and network access coordinating leading-edge research-and-development in libraries' use of electronic-information technology."

• D-Lib Forum and D-Lib Magazine http://www.dlib.org/
  "Facilitating and supporting the community developing the technology of the global digital library." Basic resource for digital preservation issues and standards.

• Digital Preservation Policy for the National Library of Australia http://www.nla.gov.au/policy/digpres.html

• A Framework of Guidance for Building Good Digital Collections [IMLS - Publications & Resources] http://www.imls.gov/scripts/text.cgi?/pubs/forumframework.htm

• Keeping Memory Alive: Practices for Preserving Content at the National Digital Library Program of the Library of Congress http://www.rlg.org/preserv/diginews/diginews4-3.html
  An article from the June 15, 2000 issue of RLG DigiNews

• OCLC/RLG Preservation Metadata Working Group http://www.oclc.org/research/pmwg/

• Preserving Access to Digital Information (PADI) http://www.nla.gov.au/padi
  "a subject gateway to digital preservation resources."
  
  
  

  Permanent Public Access To Digital Government Information

• CyberCemetery http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/
  Providing "permanent public access to the electronic Web sites and publications of defunct U.S. government agencies and commissions." Including agencies now folded into the Department of Homeland Security.

• Government Documents Round Table Rare and Endangered Government Publications Committee http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/GODORT/REGP/

• Government Documents Round Table Legislation Committee http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/GODORT/legislation/ .

• News Release No. 03-46 The GPO and National Archives Unite in Support of Permanent online Public Access http://www.gpo.gov/public-affairs/news/03news46.html
• Preserving Electronic Publications [state of Illinois] http://www.cyberdriveillinois.com/library/isl/lat/pep/pep.html
  State government documents are even more elusive than federal ones, so this project has great promise: "a collaborative proposal between Illinois and Ohio to develop a national model for monitoring changes made to electronically published state government documents on the Internet in order to ensure permanent public access."

• National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/ndiipp/

• OMB Watch http://www.ombwatch.org/
  OMBWatch is keeping track of information removed from government websites and other changes in public access to government information since the September 11 terrorist attacks.

• State by State Report on Permanent Public Access to Electronic Information http://www.ll.georgetown.edu/aallwash/State_PPAreport.htm
  
  
  

  Further Reading

• "The Electronic Genie."
  http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=
  1059387196997&call_pageid=968350072197&col=969048863851
  Story about the Digital Domesday Book becoming unusable because the equipment it was designed for became obsolete. The following article, though, shows how the data was retrieved and migrated: Domesday Redux: the Rescue of the BBC Domesday Project Videodiscs http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue36/tna/

• Keepers of the Crumbling Culture: What Digital Preservation Can Learn from Library History http://www.dlib.org/dlib/may03/friedlander/05friedlander.html

• "Storing e-Text for Centuries
  http://www.economist.com/science/tq/displayStory.cfm?story_id=1841010
  Another story about LOCKSS.

• "Why Do We Need To Keep This in Print? It's on the Web." http://libr.org/PL/19-20_Warner.html
  An important article by Dorothy Warner reviewing electronic archiving issues.
  
  
  

  Net Effects Home Page

  Chapter Ten: How Librarians Can Avoid Being Blind-Sided by Technological Change

  Marylaine Block's Home Page

  
  
  
  

  About This Web Site

  These pages are designed as a bonus for readers of Net Effects, and feature links to sites recommended by the editor.

  To make the fullest use of the resources provided here, you'll need a copy of the book, which is available from Information Today, Inc., September, 2003. ISBN: 1-57387-171-0. Price: $39.50. CLICK HERE if you'd like to order directly online.
  
  

  Updated August 12, 2003