A Moral and Legal Obligation: Preservation in the Digital Age

The Commission on Preservation and Access and the Research Libraries Group (both US organizations) created a task force to study the requirements for preserving digital information. The report, published in May 1996, recommends a certification process for digital archives and calls for a legal authority to rescue digital files in danger of being lost. The paper reviews the reactions of the library, archival, and educational communities and describes the current actions being taken.