Archivists Code of Ethics states
“archivists protect the privacy
rights of donors and individuals
or groups who are the subject of
records.” We need to think also
about the “rights” and caretaking of the collectively created
data. There are questions about
ownership of the augmented
data that need to be addressed.
We need to create a place for
discussion of practices around
data augmentation with socially
contributed metadata.
5. Designing for sustainability.
We have heard much in the
press recently about establishing provenance, considerations
of authenticity and integrity, and content rights. Recent
efforts from groups such as the
Organization for Transformative
Works address the trials of
remix and fandom with their
statement: “We envision a
future in which all fannish
works are recognized as legal
and transformative and are
accepted as a legitimate creative
activity,” wanting to protect
fans, the work, the commentary,
the history, and thus identity,
“providing the broadest possible
access to fannish activity for all
fans.” Access is certainly part
of it, but as a secondary point
preservation must be central; if
the content is not maintained,
issues of ownership and control
are moot. Who wants to be in
control of nothing?
Services and technologies
bring with them responsibility
if they are to be sustainable.
Alfred de Grazia, a pioneer in
personal digital archiving, has
reframed the problem as one of
“managing intellectual estates.”
The beneficiaries are not just
the individual user, but also
our culture as a whole, and our
descendants. Part of the solution is in an economic model
that can be used to sustain and
encourage preservation and
allow intellectual estates to be
maintained. De Grazia focused
on the needs of the academic
arena. However, with many of
us now producing portfolios of
mixed-media content for work
and being archivists of our own
past and those of others, these
points are clearly generalizable
and more relevant to a broader
audience today. As blogger Dave
Winer put it, “With all possible
humility, I’d like to tell you that
a few days after I die my entire
Web presence will likely disap-pear…And when my sites disappear, so will my uncle’s. He died
in 2003. His site is still accessible because I keep it that way.”
He points out that his uncle’s
thoughts may not be something
the world at large cares about,
but if Dave’s uncle were a Nobel
Laureate, it would likely change
things. In the same post he also
points out that most universities
do not have a plan for archiving
the Web-based content of their
professors. Clearly, some folks
need to be reminded that the
Web is an extensible publishing
platform, not an Etch A Sketch.
Digital technology makes it
possible to extend the walls
of the archive beyond a single
space or person, as well as
ensure preservation and access
in locations around the world in
what the Library of Congress is
calling a “content stewardship
network.” Libraries, museums,
and archives will need to collaborate with business interests
to build lasting social structures
that are sustainable over time.
There is much work to be done
and many stakeholders to be
engaged and heard in the merging of content from multiple
sources.
A Final Note
To close, it is worth pointing to
Terry Kuny’s 1997 paper that
circled library science networks,
warning of a coming digital dark
age when our data will be lost
and/or irretrievable unless we
individually and collectively
recognize the vulnerability of
digital data and design better
tools, procedures, services and
policies. We say: Let’s appeal
to greed, fear, utopianism, and
good design and make sure we
prove him wrong.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Dr. Elizabeth Churchill is a
principal research scientist
at Yahoo! Research leading
research in social media.
Originally a psychologist by
training, for the past 15 years she has studied and designed technologies for effective
social connection. At Yahoo, her work
focuses on how Internet applications and
services are woven into everyday lives.
Obsessed with memory and sentiment, in
her spare time Elizabeth researches how
people manage their digital and physical
archives. Elizabeth rates herself a packrat,
her greatest joy is an attic stuffed with
memorabilia.
Jeff Ubois is exploring new
approaches to personal
archiving for Fujitsu Labs of
America in Sunnyvale,
California, and to video
archiving for Intelligent
Television and Thirteen/ WNET in New York.
He has been published in First Monday,
Release 1.0, Computerworld, the Journal of
Digital Information, and D-Lib, and he blogs
at http://www.archival.tv.
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March + April 2008