Personal Archiving: Preserving our Digital Heritage

Citation

Isabel Schellnack-Kelly (2015), "Personal Archiving: Preserving our Digital Heritage", The Electronic Library, Vol. 33 No. 3, pp. 601-602. https://doi.org/10.1108/EL-09-2014-0166

Preserving memories of the past from a grandmother’s “treasured collection of early family photographs […] kept in a tin box” (p. 12) to individuals eager to preserve digitized and born-digital records as part of their digital heritage are some of the challenges associated with personal archiving. Preserving a digital legacy requires individuals to develop awareness of the archival skills involved in processing such archives to ensure accessibility and long-term preservation. Digital “benign neglect” (p. 88) coupled with technological obsolescence and limited expertise are challenges encountered by the personal archivist. The effectiveness in confronting these challenges may ultimately determine the final fate of this digital footprint.

This work is comprises of contributions providing different perspectives, facilitating interdisciplinary discussions and extending archival skills to all individuals engaging in digital preservation. The technical, legal, academic, institutional, privacy, cultural and heritage perspectives provide insight into personal archives collections, which are often neglected by archivists and archival institutions. The challenges associated with social media and the broad spectrum of tools available for personal archiving are discussed. These, thus, provide users from whatever genre, whether genealogists, archivists or collectors, with guidelines on the organization and preservation of digital records. Also noted are the concerns of the post-custodial archival scholars, who regard it as essential to create awareness among record creators concerning the preservation of their records. Through digital technology, individuals have become their own archivists in preserving their “digital documentary heritage” (p. 168).

The various discussions are illustrated with case studies. Outreach program initiatives like the Born Digital: Personal Digital Archiving Week held at the University of Columbia, in 2012, (p. 145) may be considered by similar institutions. The easy access to smart phones, i-Pads, iPods, cell phones with cameras, digital cameras and social media platforms allow individuals to determine what will be stored and remembered. The appraisal function of archives in the digital realm is no longer in the control of the archivist or institution. The role of citizen archives as “components of our collective memory” (p. 157) may provide evidence facilitating better understanding of events and family histories. The San Francisco-based Internet Archive with the mission of “universal access to all knowledge” (p. 188) and a server maintaining “over 10 petabytes of material in its collections” (p. 188) reaffirm the growing interest in the archiving of personal digital collections and their heritage value. myKive is a project allowing researchers to source records and information from “email accounts, blogs, Facebook pages, Twitter feeds, local computers” and other sources. These records are then saved to a “cloud-based server in a standardized, preservation-read format” (p. 245).

Hawkins provides a comprehensive overview for scholars, archivists and researchers interested in investigating the opportunities for individuals wanting to preserve their digital footprint for future users.