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Digital Continuity

A forum on the role of Australian Universities - 19 November 2001

The Digital Continuity Forum was organised and hosted by Swinburne University of Technology and attended by over 100 delegates.

This Digital Continuity Forum focussed on digital documents and objects which we want to keep for the long term – objects with a long-term future.

Digital continuity is the term for our expectations and plans for the continuing existence of digital documents and other objects of all kinds. We know how to look after books – provided that they are not printed on a medium which deteriorates rapidly, they will last for many centuries. However, some digital items cease to be usable after a very short period – as little as a decade. This is because of the obsolescence of hardware and software formats, lack of clear responsibility for their preservation, and issues around version control.

The Digital Continuity Forum addressed the following questions:

  • The purposes, for universities, of keeping large amounts of data.
  • How are digital documents with a long-term value stored or archived at Australian universities?
  • How will we find documents in the future? – persistent naming, DOIs, PURLSs and the like
  • How will we access the information content of physical-format digital works (CD-ROMs, floppy disks) when those formats become obsolete?
  • What is the research agenda for digital continuity?
  • What are the roles of the players – creators, publishers, libraries, other cultural institutions, universities?
  • What "archiving" systems exist? – e.g. e-print open archives, Australia’s PANDORA, national and state archives.
  • Will we attempt to maintain a museum of obsolete hardware and software, or will be aim to migrate data from old formats to new?
  • If digital continuity is basically a social concern, do we need a new social agency to undertake the role of long-term guardianship?

The agenda has so far been carried largely by major libraries and other cultural institutions. This event aimed to extend the agenda to universities, providing a forum at which the different plays, present and future, could consider the issues.

The forum included keynote speakers Mr Neil Beagrie from the UK higher education sector, and Professor Richard Slaughter from the Australian Foresight Institute at Swinburne University of Technology. Other speakers represented were the National Library of Australia, Screensound Australia, PADI (Preserving Access to Digital Information), the publishing industry, the e-archives movement, and other players.

The main goals of the forum were to:

  • Raise awareness amongst universities of the issues involved in digital continuity.
  • Develop a collaborative research agenda between universities, cultural institutions and others.

Location:

The seminar took place at the Australian Graduate School of Entrepreneurship, Swinburne University of Technology, Corner of William and Wakefield Streets, Hawthorn (See Map).

Speakers:

The forum was fortunate to secure two excellent keynote speakers.

Professor Richard Slaughter is the recently-appointed head of the Australian Foresight Institute, based at Swinburne University of Technology, and is President of the World Futures Studies Federation; he has an international reputation in futures scholarship, educational innovation, strategic foresight and the identification of a knowledge base for futures studies.

Mr Neil Beagrie is the Assistant Director, Digital Preservation, at the DNER Office in the UK. He is responsible for developing a long-term retention strategy for digital materials in the higher education sector in the UK and developing practices, policies and strategies for the preservation of digital materials.

Subjects dealt with at the Forum included:

  • Current research and projects in Australia relating to digital continuity.
  • The role of the publishing industry in assuring long-term retention of digital documentary material.
  • The presentation and archiving of Australian scholarly material published in digital form.
  • The economics of digital preservation.
  • Cultural institutions and their role in digital continuity.
  • Universities and their role in digital continuity.

The forum was chaired by Mr Sam Lipski, President of the Library Board of Victoria and member of the Council of Swinburne University.

For further information about this Forum, please contact Derek Whitehead on 03 9214 8333 or 0412 996 025 or dwhitehead@swin.edu.au or Julie Ager on 03 9214 8331 or jager@swin.edu.au