Today, information technologies tha

Today, information technologies that are increasingly powerful and easy to use, especially those that support the World Wide Web, have unleashed the production and distribution of digital information. . . . If we are effectively to preserve for future generations the portion of this rapidly expanding corpus of information in digital form that represents our cultural record, we need to understand the costs of doing so and we need to commit ourselves technically, legally, economically, and organizationally to the full dimensions of the task. Failure to look for trusted means and methods of digital preservation will certainly exact a stiff, long-term cultural penalty.

Today, information technologies that are increasingly powerful and easy to use, especially those that support the World Wide Web, have unleashed the production and distribution of digital information. . . . If we are effectively to preserve for future generations the portion of this rapidly expanding corpus of information in digital form that represents our cultural record, we need to understand the costs of doing so and we need to commit ourselves technically, legally, economically, and organizationally. to the full dimensions of the task. Failure to look for trusted means and methods of digital preservation will certainly exact a stiff, long-term cultural penalty.