Digitization for Access AND Preservation

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Digitization for AccessAND Preservation
STRATEGIES OF THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

• Keynote Address, March 2, 2007

Deanna B. Marcum Associate Librarian of Congress
for Library Services The Library of Congress
Washington, D.C.
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Digitization for Access AND Preservation

• Library of Congress provides stewardship for 132
  million items
• 58 million manuscripts
• 30 million books
• 13 million prints
• 5 million maps
• 5 million pieces of music
• 3 million sound recordings
• 1 million films and videos

collections grow by approximately 13 thousand
items every day
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CD-ROM Pilot Program, 1990-1994
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Then Came the Internet

• 1994 National Digital Library
• 13 million from private donors initially
• Donations then tripled
• Congress appropriate 15 million for 5 years

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Then Came the Internet

• 1994 National Digital Library Program
• 13 million from private donors initially
• Donations then tripled
• Congress appropriate 15 million for 5 years
• 1996 Ameritech gives 2 million for grants
• 3 year competition
• 23 grants awarded

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Then Came the Internet

• 1994 National Digital Library Program
• 13 million from private donors initially
• Donations then tripled
• Congress appropriate 15 million for 5 years
• 1996 Ameritech gives 2 million for grants
• 3 year competition
• 23 grants awarded
• 2000 Over 5 million items online

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Digital Preservation Issues

• Digital media lacks durability
• Dependant on computers for readability

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Digital Preservation Issues

• Digital media lacks durability
• Dependant on computers for readability
• Encompasses multiple formats
• Some items are born digital
• Web archiving
• Ejournals

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Five Strategic Methods Developed

• Develop better digital-storage media
• Refresh digital data
• Migrate to newer, improved formats
• Technical emulation
• Digital archaeology

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Waiting until digital material had deteriorated
to make a fix would leave us only with the
digital archaeology option. Instead, digital
preservation required ongoing management of data
from the point of creation.
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We Did Three Things

• Continued our experimentation
• Began planning to construct a National
  Audio-Visual Conservation Center
• Crossed our fingers

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We Did Three Things

• Continued our experimentation
• Began planning to construct a National
  Audio-Visual Conservation Center
• Crossed our fingers

Technology advances, while sure to present new
challenges, will also provide new solutions for
preserving digital content.
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NDIIPP
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UNC Chapel Hill
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UC San Diego
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SCOLA
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Film Preservation 1993
Only 50 of films made before 1950 survive, only
20 of feature films made in the 1920s, and only
10 of those made in the decade beginning in 1910
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Redefining Film Preservation 1994
The National Film Preservation Board and The
Library of Congress consulted with archivists,
educators, filmmakers, and film-industry
executives
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Redefining Film Preservation 1994

• Low-temperature, low-humidity storage
• Retard film deterioration
• Buy time for restoration
• Availability of films for education and
  exhibition
• Public-private partnership
• Share preservation information
• Restore important films
• Search foreign archives for lost American films
• Create a foundation
• Preserve newsreels, documentaries, independent
  and avant-garde films, and significant amateur
  footage

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National Recording Preservation Act

• Establish a National Recording Registry
• Study current preservation practices/needs
• Create a plan for a national audio preservation
  program

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Audio preservation today is not simply a matter
of collecting and storing, or transferring
endangered records to the digital domain.  
To achieve the objectives of long-term
preservation requires a commitment to long-term
processes which may have no discernible end.
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National Audio Preservation Program

• Public hearings were held
• Comments were solicited comments from
• Representatives of sound-recording archives
• Recording companies
• Audio engineers
• Interested scholarly organizations
• Specialists in intellectual-property law
• Individuals with collections of recorded sound

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National Audiovisual Collection Center
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National Audiovisual Collection Center

• Complex of four structures covering forty-five
  acres
• 415,000 square feet
• Southeast of Culpeper, Virginia
• Packard Humanities Institute will transfer the
  complex to the Architect of the Capitol
• Final cost 150 million

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National Audiovisual Collection Center

• Motion Picture, Broadcasting, and Recorded Sound
• Complete collections and facilities
• Up to 150 staff
• Collections Building will store audiovisual
  collections
• Nitrate film will go into specially constructed
  vaults
• Central Plant Building
• Electrical controls, heating, and
  air-conditioning
• Conservation Building and Theater
• Administrative, curatorial, and processing staffs
• Leading-edge laboratories for analog and digital
  preservation of film, video, and sound recordings

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National Audiovisual Collection Center

• Conservation building underground
• Provides energy-efficient, low-temperature
  storage
• State-of-the-art audio-listening facility
• 200-seat theatre with an organ console
• Audiovisual reference service will remain in D.C.
• Electronic access to soundand video materials
• Film will be transported

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The center will implement digital preservation as
a replacement for reformatting onto increasingly
obsolete analog formats. The change will be
evolutionary and sequenced.
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Scribe Scanning Technology
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New Selection Criteria

• VALUE
• Are the materials of national interest?

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New Selection Criteria

• VALUE
• Are the materials of national interest?
• CONDITION
• Are digital copies needed because the original
  materials are unserviceable?

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New Selection Criteria

• VALUE
• Are the materials of national interest?
• CONDITION
• Are digital copies needed because the original
  materials are unserviceable?
• USE
• Are the materials in demand? Will making digital
  copies for use reduce expense in serving the
  items?

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New Selection Criteria

• VALUE
• Are the materials of national interest?
• CONDITION
• Are digital copies needed because the original
  materials are unserviceable?
• USE
• Are the materials in demand? Will making digital
  copies for use reduce expense in serving the
  items?
• CHARACTERISTICS
• Do the physical formats of the materials lend
  themselves to digitization at an acceptably high
  level of reproduction?

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Life-Cycle Management

• Extend the longevity of media on which digital
  data are stored
• Improve environmental conditions for digital
  media
• Develop software and hardware requirements for
  extending longevity and usability of digital data
  
• Create methods and schedules for checking and
  maintaining the integrity of digital files

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New Strategic Plan for 2008-2013
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New Plan for 2008-2013

• Expand our skills at collecting traditional works
  to the digital world
• Advance the science and practice of preserving
  digital works
• Develop trusted repositories for digital items in
  LCs collections

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Strategic Directions

• Continue to digitize as much material as possible
• Take advantage of electronic media to make
  resources available worldwide
• Extend the reach of our museums and libraries
• Use digitization to help meet preservation needs
• Providing access to digital copies enables
  reductions in the use of fragile originals

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Strategic Directions

• Continue to digitize as much material as possible
• Take advantage of electronic media to make
  resources available worldwide
• Extend the reach of our museums and libraries
• Use digitization to help meet preservation needs
• Providing access to digital copies enables
  reductions in the use of fragile originals
• Recognize that there is no universal solution for
  digital preservation
• We need to work together and share advances

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Thank You
Deanna B. Marcum Associate Librarian of Congress
for Library Services The Library of Congress
Washington, D.C.