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ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 49| February 2001
Safeguarding
Australias Web Resources:
Guidelines for Creators and Publishers
Creators, publishers and libraries all have a vital role to play in ensuring information resources made available on the Internet, remain available for use into the future. Australian web resources form a significant part of our documentary heritage and action must be taken now to safeguard them.
The National Library has published guidelines providing practical advice on creating, describing, naming and managing web resources to facilitate their ongoing use. The guidelines, Safeguarding Australias Web Resources, are intended primarily to assist those publishers and creators who do not already have well-established data management procedures in place. They raise awareness of the issues to be addressed and outline action that needs to be taken to enable future preservation of web resources to be carried out.
Libraries can play a valuable role in safeguarding Australias web resources by publicising the guidelines widely within their institutions and encouraging adoption of the sound data management and archiving practices outlined in the guidelines.
The guidelines are available at www.nla.gov.au/guidelines/2000/webresources.html
and also in print form from the National Library. For copies or for more
information about the Librarys digital archiving and preservation
strategies, contact Pam Gatenby, Assistant Director-General, Collection
Management Division, at pgatenby@nla.gov.au,
or tel: (02) 6262 1672.
Pam Gatenby
Please address any comments and enquiries to The Editor, Gateways: dthomas@nla.gov.au