Development of RMJ: A mirror of the development of the profession and discipline of record management

The purpose of this paper is to examine critically the history of Records Management Journal on its 20th anniversary; it aims to review and analyse its evolution and its contribution in the context of the development of the profession and the discipline of records management. The paper seeks to provide the context and justification for the selection of eight articles previously published in the journal to be reprinted in this issue

Creative Archiving: A Case Study from the John Latham Archive

This article looks at the history of the archive profession and emphasises the perceived role of the archivist as the keeper of truth. It focuses on the recent developments in archival practice with the adoption of post-modern thinking and its implementation with open-access archives online. Following a discussion of that approach, it introduces the concept of creative archiving as an alternative approach to archival practice and continues with the presentation of a case study from the John Latham Archive. It concludes with a discussion of the main pros and cons of creative archiving

The History and Current State of Digital Preservation in the United States

Chapter 7 of 8.The world of information is becoming ever more digital. While advances in information technology have undeniable advantages, they also pose significant threats to the long-term accessibility of information. Digital information is not durable. The goal of digital preservation is to maintain the ability to display, retrieve, and use digital collections in the face of rapidly changing technological and organizational infrastructures and elements. For over a decade now, a small group of librarians, archivists, publishers, and technologists have been trying to address how best to ensure that the digital information of today is still accessible to the future. This paper will survey some of the efforts that are underway in North America to understand how best to preserve digital information. Major investigations into the issues of digital preservation are currently underway at the Library of Congress, the National Archives and Records Administration, in a number of university-based research projects, at the national bibliographic utilities, and at some technical laboratories. A number of different technical solutions are being explored, and it is likely that the best digital preservation solutions will use a combination of technical approaches. Studies have revealed that the biggest impediments to digital preservation are not primarily technical. Even more important are issues of ownership, economics, and organization.Cornell University Librar

Electronic Records Archives

What are the best practices of electronic records archives the archival field, how can problems be resolved or how to avoid them; and where do we go from here with electronic records archives? First I review practices, policies, and management of electronic records developments. Next I discuss problematic issues archives and research facilities face relating to electronic records. I then discuss and analyze survey results. To conclude, I discuss ideas, and challenges, and offer suggestions for electronic records archives

The Digital Dark Ages: Preserving History in the Era of Electronic Records

There is mounting concern that, due to the rapid pace of technological advancement and the volatile nature of digital media, electronic records of enduring value will be lost if they are not identified for preservation and managed accordingly. If this issue remains unresolved, organizations face a future digital dark age where valuable information assets and cultural history are lost forever. This paper explores the digital preservation need with respect to public higher education institutions through literature review and a survey of practitioners. Several major government-sponsored projects were reviewed, providing insights into the complexity and scale of the issue with none of the projects able to fully address all issues. Results indicate that organizations are insufficiently prepared to identify electronic records of enduring value so that digital preservation techniques may be applied. Recommendations are provided for Information Systems professionals to address this burgeoning need

#MPLP: a Comparison of Domain Novice and Expert User-generated Tags in a Minimally Processed Digital Archive

The high costs of creating and maintaining digital archives precluded many archives from providing users with digital content or increasing the amount of digitized materials. Studies have shown users increasingly demand immediate online access to archival materials with detailed descriptions (access points). The adoption of minimal processing to digital archives limits the access points at the folder or series level rather than the item-level description users\u27 desire. User-generated content such as tags, could supplement the minimally processed metadata, though users are reluctant to trust or use unmediated tags. This dissertation project explores the potential for controlling/mediating the supplemental metadata from user-generated tags through inclusion of only expert domain user-generated tags. The study was designed to answer three research questions with two parts each: 1(a) What are the similarities and differences between tags generated by expert and novice users in a minimally processed digital archive?, 1(b) Are there differences between expert and novice users\u27 opinions of the tagging experience and tag creation considerations?, 2(a) In what ways do tags generated by expert and/or novice users in a minimally processed collection correspond with metadata in a traditionally processed digital archive?, 2(b) Does user knowledge affect the proportion of tags matching unselected metadata in a minimally processed digital archive?, 3(a) In what ways do tags generated by expert and/or novice users in a minimally processed collection correspond with existing users\u27 search terms in a digital archive?, and 3(b) Does user knowledge affect the proportion of tags matching query terms in a minimally processed digital archive? The dissertation project was a mixed-methods, quasi-experimental design focused on tag generation within a sample minimally processed digital archive. The study used a sample collection of fifteen documents and fifteen photographs. Sixty participants divided into two groups (novices and experts) based on assessed prior knowledge of the sample collection\u27s domain generated tags for fifteen documents and fifteen photographs (a minimum of one tag per object). Participants completed a pre-questionnaire identifying prior knowledge, and use of social tagging and archives. Additionally, participants provided their opinions regarding factors associated with tagging including the tagging experience and considerations while creating tags through structured and open-ended questions in a post-questionnaire. An open-coding analysis of the created tags developed a coding scheme of six major categories and six subcategories. Application of the coding scheme categorized all generated tags. Additional descriptive statistics summarized the number of tags created by each domain group (expert, novice) for all objects and divided by format (photograph, document). T-tests and Chi-square tests explored the associations (and associative strengths) between domain knowledge and the number of tags created or types of tags created for all objects and divided by format. The subsequent analysis compared the tags with the metadata from the existing collection not displayed within the sample collection participants used. Descriptive statistics summarized the proportion of tags matching unselected metadata and Chi-square tests analyzed the findings for associations with domain knowledge. Finally, the author extracted existing users\u27 query terms from one month of server-log data and compared the generated-tags and unselected metadata. Descriptive statistics summarized the proportion of tags and unselected metadata matching query terms, and Chi-square tests analyzed the findings for associations with domain knowledge. Based on the findings, the author discussed the theoretical and practical implications of including social tags within a minimally processed digital archive