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PRESERVATION NEWSC&RL News, September 2007Vol. 68, No. 8 by Jane Hedberg Illinois AV assessment tool The library at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) received a three-year grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to develop an Audio-Visual Self-Assessment Program (AVSAP). This open-source interactive program will guide users through a description of audiovisual collections at either the collection or item level, and then assess condition and preservation needs. Collection managers will answer questions about format, physical appearance, age, use, value, potential copyright infringement, and provenance and storage. The program will provide guidelines for reformatting, re-housing, long-term storage, and potential for digital distribution. If the survey is conducted item by item, the program will also suggest basic metadata for digital copies. This program is scheduled for completion December 2009 and will be made available free-of-charge on the project Web site. For more information and to track the project’s progress, go to www.library.uiuc.edu/prescons/AVSAP.htm. BL conservation center British Library (BL) opened its new Centre for Conservation May 17, 2007. The center is dedicated to book, paper, and audio conservation, housing approximately 80 staff members in a new purpose-built three-story facility. In addition to the conservation studios and labs, there are facilities for education and training. A primary component of the education program will be tours, seminars, and workshops open to the public. BL has created a Web presence that has information about the Centre for Conservation and its events, plus video showing conservation of BL’s Sutra of the Ten Kings (Chinese, 10th century), Ramayana (Tibetan, 9-10th century), Diamond Sutra (Chinese, 9th century), Animal Zodiac (Khotanese, 9th century), and Mercator Atlas (Flanders, 16th century). Visit the center online at www.bl.uk/conservation. Optical disk test standard Optical Storage Technology Association and Ecma International have announced completion of a standard for testing the life expectancy of recordable and rewritable optical disks. This new standard will make it easier for purchasers to select disks suitable for long-term storage of information. It was developed by a multinational team and received support from CD and DVD manufacturers, related industry associations, and standards associations. The standard is currently available on the Ecma Web site at www.ecma-international.org/publications/standards/Ecma-379.htm. It is slated for fast-track procedure by the International Standards Organization and is expected to be released as an ISO/IEC standard sometime after December 2007. “Persistence of Memory” The Northeast Document Conservation Center (NEDCC) is presenting “Persistence of Memory: Stewardship of Digital Assets” November 28–29, 2007, in Seattle, Washington. This two-day conference will introduce participants to the best practices for ensuring the long-term retention of both digitized and born digital cultural resources and address organizational, financial, and technological challenges to digital preservation. Registration costs $350. For more information, contact Julie Carlson at NEDCC, 100 Brickstone Square, Andover, MA 01810-1494; phone: (978) 470-1010; fax: (978) 475-6021; -mail: jcarlson@nedcc.org; URL: www.nedcc.org/education/conferences/pom/description.php. Jane Hedberg is preservation program officer at Harvard University Library, e-mail: jane_hedberg@harvard.edu; fax: (617) 496-8344 |
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