In this episode, Dennis is joined by Laura Farley Digital Curation Librarian at the People’s Archive at DC Public Library to discuss organizing and preserving your organization's digital files. Laura shares her digital preservation mantra, start small, start now.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauramfarley/ 

• What is digital preservation?

• Best practices

• Concepts:

  • Inventory: Documents, usable, available, scalable, current

  • Use familiar software, be consistent, comprehensive, and concise

  • You choose the level of detail

  • You can’t and don’t want to keep everything - storage can be cheap but management is not

  • How to select: Review and prioritize, define, document, implement

  • Identify: what do you have

  • Select: what to preserve

• Store:
  • long term storage of materials

• • File format, access

  • Access needs: online, near-line, offline storage, -- it depends on how quickly you need to access your files.

  • Cost: what resources do you have, should you build, buy, or join in a collaboration with others with similar needs?

  • Quantity (size and number of files)

  • Expertise: What are the skills required to manage your digital objects and do you have these or need to pay for them

  • Reliability: is the storage well reviewed, well supported

  • How many copies? A minimum of 2

• Storage

• • 3-2-1 Rule

• • Example: 2 external hard drives, Cloud storage (not Facebook)

• • Example: 2 external hard drives (1 stored off-site), Computer

key takeaways from today’s show:

• Identify: what do you have

• Select: what to preserve

• Store: long-term storage of materials

• Multiple storage types and locations

Resource & Best Practices Guidelines:

Library of Congress Digital Preservation Outreach & Education

https://www.dpoe.network

Library of Congress Sustainability of Digital Formats

https://www.loc.gov/preservation/digital/formats/index.html

Tools & Templates

Filelist Creator

https://www.sttmedia.com/filelistcreator-faq

Jennifer Ferretti’s Retention Schedule

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1XO1XNavZnidmcR2kDBN2lCqsoM-GYqfxg6QcP5qCaW0/edit?usp=sharing

Jennifer Ferretti’s Metadata for Personal Digital Archiving 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17KMvZMuNeGT2hv9TyZXgHZ-QSap-vd6NXPa1frPoHHM/edit?usp=sharing

Maryland Institute College of Art - Batch Embed Metadata in Adobe Bridge Cheat Sheet

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zLB-K9KWOJITqmVC-upA7zoJzuunaPcDiwp8rq11QTw/edit?usp=sharing

Copyright

United States Copyright Office Works Not Protected by Copyright

https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ33.pdf

Society of American Archivists Selected Copyright Resources

https://www2.archivists.org/groups/intellectual-property-working-group/selected-copyright-resources