<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2//EN"> <HTML> <HEAD> <META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <META NAME="Generator" CONTENT="MS Exchange Server version 6.5.7036.0"> <TITLE>State of the Art in Long-Term Digital Preservation</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY>  Ref: S. Ross, Digital Preservation, Archival Science and Methodological Foundations for Digital Libraries, 11th European Conference on Digital Libraries (ECDL), Budapest, September 2007.  Copy available at <A HREF="http://www.ecdl2007.org/Keynote_ECDL2007_SROSS.pdf">http://www.ecdl2007.org/Keynote_ECDL2007_SROSS.pdf</A> This paper is as close to anything I have seen to expressing a digital preservation community(*) view of the state of the art.  It is also remarkably candid with its opinion that progress (in that community) has pretty much stalled.  My summary, extracted from something I'm just now writing, is attached. If you were to read this paper and peek at the articles it cites, you would be well informed. Cheerio, Henry H.M. Gladney, Ph.D. <A HREF="http://home.pacbell.net/hgladney">http://home.pacbell.net/hgladney</A> (*) Long-term preservation of digitally represented information has been discussed for over a decade in articles by librarians, archivists, and information scientists, an informal group sometimes called the digital preservation community (DPC).  This literature is mostly disjoint from that of computer science, software engineering, and information technology industry.  From the perspective of an engineer accustomed to the pace of IT research and development, progress reported in the DPC literature is surprisingly slow. International conferences and workshops occur in rapid succession.  However, these seem to discuss little more than LDP urgency and social processes for collaboration, without addressing novel concepts or engineering specifics.  A recent notice is typical: <UL> Leading figures from the international science community will meet today to try and save the digital records of the world’s scientific knowledge from being lost. Policy-makers from the European Commission and national governments will convene with world-renowned research organisations and digital preservation experts at a strategic conference in Brussels. They will discuss creation of an Alliance and European infrastructure for preserving and providing permanent access to digital scientific information currently stored in formats which are fast becoming obsolete and growing exponentially in volume. Jackson </UL> </BODY> </HTML>