Long-term preservation in Europe. The strategy of the Alliance for Permanent Access

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1 Long-term preservation in Europe The strategy of the Alliance for Permanent Access Hans Jansen Director R&D, National Library of the Netherlands Rome, 29 October 2007 The first objective of the i2010 strategy of the European Commission is the creation of a single European Information Space. This information space should advance the generation of new knowledge in Europe. It is my belief that the preservation of and long-term access to digital media should emerge as one of the key issues in the debate. As you all know, our growing dependence on digital information presents us with a number of major risks. Particularly in the long-term management, access and preservation of this information many unresolved challenges remain. The fast pace of change in the technological landscape makes ensuring long-term access to digital material problematic. Storage media may degrade. Technological developments make systems obsolete. And information can be rendered inaccessible by changes in encoding formats. Long-term preservation of digital information is becoming a major issue for policy-makers and for research. In a long series of EU-presidency workshops on this topic the KB, the national library of the Netherlands, organised the conference Permanent Access to the Records of Science in In contrast with its predecessors this conference did not concentrate merely on the cultural heritage sector, but tried to bring together the worlds of culture and science. And this link is obvious. One of the main problems faced by scientists today is that they are drowning in data. Scientific problems become more complicated, and the models and instruments 1

2 scientists use to study them become more complex. The amount of generated research data is increasing rapidly; in some cases even at exponential rates. Next to that, the rate at which the scientific world has become digital poses a threat to the access of research information. We all know that science depends entirely on the knowledge gained in the past to further advance. Therefore, the prospect of losing the digital records of science is very alarming. The i2010 strategy of the Commission has put digital preservation firmly on the agenda; both in the science and cultural heritage sector. There is a growing realisation that the answer to the challenges calls for coordinated approaches on both national and international level. Digital preservation is too big an issue for individual institutions or even sectors to address on their own. The required effort is simply not feasible. International exchange and collaboration are essential. A common European approach to digital preservation is needed. Over the last years the European Commission has supported the creation of digital libraries and digital repositories through a large number of projects. The brochure of the Commission on the digital libraries initiative presents us an impressive overview of no less than twenty four ongoing projects in this area. Under the fifth and sixth framework programmes projects were funded that focus on developing relevant technical tools. Others concerned the building of networks between interested technical experts. Other EU programmes, like the i2010 Digital Libraries initiative and the eten and econtentplus programmes, have supported the creation of digital libraries. The DILIGENT project is an important example is this list. Several of these projects focus on digital preservation. I mention PLANETS, DPE and CASPAR. 2

3 So many initiatives, but we all know that projects by definition have a limited focus and time frame. The big challenge for the coming years will therefore be to establish a viable and sustainable infrastructure for access to our European cultural and scientific heritage. In FP7 the aim is to gradually address scientific information itself as the third layer for which infrastructural elements need to be developed as support for science (next to the physical communication network and the GRID tools). The High Level Expert Group on Digital Libraries has identified scientific information as one of its key areas. Preservation of digital scientific information in interoperable and high quality repositories that receive sustainable funding is an essential prerequisite for the future of science in Europe. The European Alliance for Permanent Access aims to become the driving force in the efforts to realise such an infrastructure. The founding partners of this Alliance are all major stakeholders from the worlds of science, libraries and archives, and publishing. You see their names behind me on screen. Now what does the Alliance want to achieve within Europe? In its position paper it is stated that: The Alliance is developing a shared vision and framework for a sustainable virtual infrastructure for permanent access to scientific information. This will include all disciplines from physical, biological, or environmental sciences, to social sciences and humanities. The Alliance advocates a pragmatic approach both to the idea of an infrastructure that serves all scientific fields and how to accomplish this. The basic notion is the assumption that the repository infrastructure will be different for each scientific community, from particle physics to life sciences. 3

4 The repositories will be part and parcel of organisations that exist within a particular community. In particle physics for example CERN will definitely be one of the main repositories. The repositories should also benefit from a number of common facilities: from common R&D activities or a framework that offers technical tools, to a single accreditation body for guaranteeing the quality of companies or organisations that verify whether a repository meets the requirements. The repositories themselves are physical, but the overall infrastructure is virtual: there is no need for a central governing body, though some kind of competence centre to support the common goals makes sense. So how does the Alliance want to achieve these goals? The key to the approach of the Alliance is the engagement with the various scientific communities to help them build their part of the infrastructure. The practical experience of the Alliance members is very important here. The Alliance can also establish the connections to a variety of parties, including policy makers and funding bodies. This way, communities will be assisted in some crucial preservation activities, like: identifying which digital information to preserve and for how long; identifying key repositories; establishing a scheme for metadata suitable for the community; organising test beds, etc. The pragmatic approach of the Alliance is also shown by the choice to start with three or four communities that are already reasonably well-organised. The actions that are needed within Europe are so closely connected to the process of science that the stakeholders directly involved in that process must be in the driver s seat. 4

5 The Alliance has expressed the ambition to be a strategic partner for the Commission and national governments to help develop and implement their policies in the area of preservation and long-term access. To initiate this discussion, the Alliance organises a strategic conference in Brussels on 15 November that will be attended by representatives of the Commission, of national governments and of the major ongoing projects in the field of digital preservation. At this conference the Alliance will present it vision and aims. Securing the permanence of our digital cultural and scientific heritage is in the interest of all parties involved: authors, researchers, librarians, archivists and publishers alike. All these parties will benefit from the availability of a European infrastructure for permanent access. They can accelerate their own efforts and impact. They can share resources. And they can profit from the momentum and added value the Alliance intends to generate with the support of governments and the EU. 5