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Long-Term Management and Preservation of Publications on CD-ROMs and Floppy Disks: Roles and Responsibilities

Presentation by Maggie Jones, Director, Collection Management & Retrieval Service, National Library of Australia at the National Consultative Meeting on the Management of Australian Physical-Format Digital Publications, National Library of Australia, October 27-28 1997

  • Assumptions
  • Partnerships
  • Cooperation
  • Resource Issues
  • Technical Issues
  • Organisational Issues
  • Legal and Voluntary Deposit

Assumptions

Our initial assumption was that State and National Libraries would take the prime role in preserving long-term access to physical format publications and this was borne out by the survey results, which indicated that each State Library and the National Library - in other words those libraries who have already taken responsibility for preserving the Australian print publishing output - have made the same commitment to physical format digital publications that they make to their print counterparts. There was also agreement on this from the publishers in their survey, with most regarding libraries as the most appropriate bodies to assume responsibility for long-term preservation.

Partnerships

Interestingly the publisher's survey indicated that 17 out of 39 responded positively to the question which asked whether they were prepared to take responsibility for providing long-term access to the information they published - that was a more surprising survey result and suggests that partnerships between libraries and some publishers is also a possibility, at least while the product is commercially viable. Two library survey respondents mentioned other potential partners, they suggested some universities and large Government Departments.

31 out of 43 publishers responding to the survey said they were prepared to assist libraries in preserving their products provided they had certain assurances mostly related to copyright concerns regarding potential loss of revenue.

So, overall, we've seen a very strong commitment from the libraries to take on the responsibility to preserve this category of digital publication, on the basis that it forms as much a part of our Australian cultural heritage as material in other formats. There are also encouraging indications of a willingness to cooperate from the publishers, subject to reasonable assurances from libraries regarding copyright concerns.

Cooperation

All of the libraries surveyed favoured a cooperative approach to preservation - again continuing a long held tradition of cooperation in such matters.

All of those libraries who assume a preservation role favoured a geographic approach to the allocation of responsibilities, echoing arrangements already in place for print publications, for example the National Plan for Australian Newspapers and implying a view that existing models which have served well for paper can translate to a digital environment too.

Other areas for potential cooperation between libraries and publishers is in the information provided on the packaging. The survey results appeared to indicate quite a high correlation between the information required by most libraries, and that already supplied by publishers surveyed. There were a total of 39 publishers responses to this question in the survey and a total of 8 library responses. The following table illustrates the match between what publisher's regularly provide with the packaging and what libraries said they would like:

Information on packaging

Publisher's regularly provide

Libraries would like

Hardware platform

38/39 (97%)

6/8 (75%)

Processor speed

26/39 (67%)

6/8 (75%)

RAM

34/39 (87%)

6/8 (75%)

Hard disk space

25/39 (64%)

6/8 (75%)

CD-ROM drive speed

21/39 (54%)

6/8 (75%)

Type of monitor

21/39 (54%)

6/8 (75%)

Resolution

23/39 (59%)

5/8 (63%)

Sound card

17/39 (44%)

6/8 (75%)

Operating system

29/39 (74%)

6/8 (75%)

Other software

16/39 (41%)

5/8 (63%)

Software drivers

9/39 (23%)

6/8 (75%)

Minimum requirements for operation

33/39 (85%)

6/8 (75%)

Recommended requirements

24/39 (62%)

7/8 (88%)

Whether software supplied

8/39 (28%)

7/8 (88%)

Year of manufacture

32/39 (82%)

8/8 (100%)

Copyright warning

33/39 (85%)

7/8 (88%)

Licensing conditions

29/39 (74%)

8/8 (100%)

Key: Number of responses who answered yes / Total number of responses

Resource Issues

Resources are likely to be an issue for most libraries accepting a preservation role, only one implied additional resources had been provided for this purpose. Two other libraries indicated diverting resources from elsewhere in order to this activity. Resource issues may impact on the national model, if a geographic basis of allocating responsibilities is favoured, as those states which have a relatively large publishing output for this category of materials will presumably have to bear a proportionally greater burden than others.

Technical Issues

While libraries have shown a strong commitment to taking responsibility for this category of publication, the fact remains we don't actually know how to do it yet. This is clear from our experience at the NLA, which Colin referred to in his presentation on technical issues, and which the groups discussed in some detail. Thankfully this isn't seen as a reason not to make a commitment or not to find ways of making progress, but there are still a number of obstacles to be overcome before we can provide the same commitment to this category of publication that we give to print. Both the publishers and libraries express the same view that technological obsolescence is the biggest challenge, the carriers may well have long lives (and we're hearing 100 years as the expected CD-ROM life becoming pretty well a standard claim from manufacturers these days), but the hardware and software to read it certainly isn't going to be around nearly as long. We keep hearing that CD-ROMs are an interim technology and some publishers referred to this in their survey responses to the question whether it was desirable for the information to be preserved long-term (for the purposes of this survey, long-term was defined as > 5 years!). 9 out of 34 respondents answered no to this question and cited the anticipated obsolescence of the technology during that time - though this does still beg the question of what happens to the information contained in those publications - is it likely to be information which should be preserved for the future? How will we know how to assess that? If it does need to be preserved, how will we do it? There are also, of course, resource issues associated with our being able to overcome those obstacles so any cooperation and assistance we receive from the publishers will be especially welcome.

Organisational Issues

Organisational issues may also be relevant. The fact that there are eleven NLA staff attending this meeting, representing three of the four programs within the Library and five separate Branches, all of whom have some direct or indirect role to play in the preservation of this material, gives a fairly graphic illustration of the diverse range of activities which preservation of this category of material encompasses. Library survey results indicated a similar pattern, with most indicating at least four separate areas with responsibility allocated for the life cycle between acquisition and preservation. Given the need to start the preservation cycle much earlier in the digital environment than in the print environment, there is some potential for confusion in allocation of roles and responsibilities within an organisation and/or the possibility of competing demands/priorities.

Legal and Voluntary Deposit

As the presentation on legal and commercial issues made clear, legal deposit is a key mechanism for ensuring a nation's print publishing output is preserved for the future and this is no less true for digital publications. Four states already have legal deposit legislation which encompasses physical format digital publications and there are moves afoot to change other state and Commonwealth legislation. The NLA made a joint submission with the NFSA to the Copyright Law Review Committee, on legal deposit, which amongst other things, recommended that the scope of publications covered by the revised Copyright Act be extended to include electronic publications, both networked and artefactual (e.g. CD-ROM). The W.A replacement legislation is intended to go before Parliament late in 1997 and will presumably also include an extended definition of what constitutes a publication.

Those who do not currently have relevant State or Commonwealth legislation rely on voluntary deposit arrangements with publishers, sometimes these are accompanied by formal agreements, sometimes not. Some, if not all of the publishers represented today will have certainly entered into voluntary or legal deposit arrangements with the libraries represented here today and will be able to provide feedback on how the system works from their perspective.

For further information contact:

Maggie Jones, Director, Collection Management & Retrieval Service
National Library of Australia
E-mail: mjones@nla.gov.au
Telephone: +61 2 6262 1662
Facsimile: +61 2 6273 4535

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Last updated 6 Jauary 1998
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