The repository in perpetuity?

At Tackling the preservation challenge: Practical steps for repository managers workshop held by the Digital Preservation Coalition (DPC), the Repositories Support Project, the Digital Curation Centre and JISC on 12 December 2008, keynote speaker Neil Beagrie of Charles Beagrie Ltd gave a very good presentation on why digital preservation matters and the importance of getting senior institutional managers interested to support policies in this area.

He pointed to the lack of policies in most HEIs, evidenced by his work on the JISC-funded Digital preservation policies study (October 2008) authored by Neil and others. This study looks at outlining a model for digital preservation policies and to look at how digital preservation can help support key strategies for HEIs. Neil asked the audience to read the study and give him feedback on the suggested examples for policies, which ones are useful and which could be improved upon.

He encouraged all members of the DPC to have a digital preservation policy officially written and published on their institutional website. He also encouraged other groups, like Research Councils UK, the Russell Group, the 1994 Group, etc, to develop policies on digital preservation for their members to use. One of the main recommendations from the report is that funders should use the study to evaluate and encourage best practice in terms of institutional preservation policies and procedures and their development in their funded programmes and evaluations.