SPEC Kit 325: Digital Preservation · 73
Additional Comments
41. Please enter any additional information that may assist the authors to understand your library’s
strategies for digital preservation. N=21
Barriers to investing in digital content: Lack of an overarching and proper preservation strategy. Ideally the library would
use the same system the university uses to preserve research and administrative data. Lack of funds is a barrier. The
number of “copies” that is believed to be necessary. Preservation is not really achieved if there is only one copy.
Barriers to investing in digital preservation include limited funding and limited human resources.
Barriers to investing in the preservation of digital content: institutional priorities and resources no well-articulated role
in the academic environment consequences of not preserving the material not immediately evident.
Building a reliable digital preservation infrastructure is quite a challenging task, given our limitations in terms of staff
and expertise. We strongly believe that in the longer term, community-based solutions will be the most viable for us, but
the ones that exist now are not necessary well tailored to our needs, or are still in their infancy. We strongly hope that
ARL will help move things in this direction.
Currently, we have multiple copies of items. We are aware of the importance of a digital preservation plan, so we
are looking into it. We have a storage system that self replicates and checks itself, but it is not a 10-year and digital
preservation solution. Also looking into Cloud/distributed storage for digital preservation.
Digital preservation is a priority area but it continues to prove challenging to give it the full attention it deserves in
light of the large number of other digital projects we execute. However, digital preservation has become a consistent
expectation for most of our collections work preservation goals and outcomes are addressed in projects as they arise
even though they may lack some of the formality and detail required to satisfy TRAC and other standards.
It would be useful to unbundle the survey by asset type given range of issues, approaches, institutional context, etc.
Our approach must be collaborative on an international level. Sustainability will be key.
Our digital resource programs are the most sophisticated in the region. Additionally, we host online digital asset
management tools for repositories in three adjoining states and 15 cultural heritage institutions in New Mexico.
Our goal is to collaborate with other stakeholders on campus to ensure preservation of the university’s valuable digital
information assets. We provide expertise in preservation planning, metadata management, and archives management,
but we have no plan to implement a repository solution to meet all of the university’s preservation needs. We foresee
that the university’s ongoing preservation strategy will involve a range of university systems—including web content
management systems, document management systems, digital asset management systems, and dedicated archival
repositories—guided by an overarching university preservation strategy and policy, with preservation plans developed
for each collection or resource requiring long-term preservation.
The costs of participatory solutions such as MetaArchive or the Florida Digital Archive tend to run high for institutions
such as our own with collections over 20 TB and projected to grow at least 10 TB a year. The challenge for us now is
deciding on whether to commit the funds to a collaborative venture, or spend funds internally to run our own trusted
digital repository.
Additional Comments
41. Please enter any additional information that may assist the authors to understand your library’s
strategies for digital preservation. N=21
Barriers to investing in digital content: Lack of an overarching and proper preservation strategy. Ideally the library would
use the same system the university uses to preserve research and administrative data. Lack of funds is a barrier. The
number of “copies” that is believed to be necessary. Preservation is not really achieved if there is only one copy.
Barriers to investing in digital preservation include limited funding and limited human resources.
Barriers to investing in the preservation of digital content: institutional priorities and resources no well-articulated role
in the academic environment consequences of not preserving the material not immediately evident.
Building a reliable digital preservation infrastructure is quite a challenging task, given our limitations in terms of staff
and expertise. We strongly believe that in the longer term, community-based solutions will be the most viable for us, but
the ones that exist now are not necessary well tailored to our needs, or are still in their infancy. We strongly hope that
ARL will help move things in this direction.
Currently, we have multiple copies of items. We are aware of the importance of a digital preservation plan, so we
are looking into it. We have a storage system that self replicates and checks itself, but it is not a 10-year and digital
preservation solution. Also looking into Cloud/distributed storage for digital preservation.
Digital preservation is a priority area but it continues to prove challenging to give it the full attention it deserves in
light of the large number of other digital projects we execute. However, digital preservation has become a consistent
expectation for most of our collections work preservation goals and outcomes are addressed in projects as they arise
even though they may lack some of the formality and detail required to satisfy TRAC and other standards.
It would be useful to unbundle the survey by asset type given range of issues, approaches, institutional context, etc.
Our approach must be collaborative on an international level. Sustainability will be key.
Our digital resource programs are the most sophisticated in the region. Additionally, we host online digital asset
management tools for repositories in three adjoining states and 15 cultural heritage institutions in New Mexico.
Our goal is to collaborate with other stakeholders on campus to ensure preservation of the university’s valuable digital
information assets. We provide expertise in preservation planning, metadata management, and archives management,
but we have no plan to implement a repository solution to meet all of the university’s preservation needs. We foresee
that the university’s ongoing preservation strategy will involve a range of university systems—including web content
management systems, document management systems, digital asset management systems, and dedicated archival
repositories—guided by an overarching university preservation strategy and policy, with preservation plans developed
for each collection or resource requiring long-term preservation.
The costs of participatory solutions such as MetaArchive or the Florida Digital Archive tend to run high for institutions
such as our own with collections over 20 TB and projected to grow at least 10 TB a year. The challenge for us now is
deciding on whether to commit the funds to a collaborative venture, or spend funds internally to run our own trusted
digital repository.
