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This study uses three archiving efforts at the New York Times as a means to analyse the newspaper as an archival object. I study the traditional 'morgue' of physical clippings and photos, the Times' joint project with Google Cloud to digitize its photo collection, and the TimesMachine interactive digital archive, which made scanned editions of printed issues from 1851 to 2002 publicly available online. Based on interviews with staff and analysis of documents describing past and present newspaper archiving practices, it is clear that the digital archive is not a comprehensive copy of an analogue original. There are a significant number of documents stored in physical archives that have not been translated to digital, and whose loss would be detrimental to historians and media scholars alike. Moreover, even the documents that have been scanned and made available as digital objects do not perfectly mirror their analogue equivalents, meaning that information loss is inherent to the digitization process. As active producers of the past for contemporary purposes, these online news archives serve as cultural gatekeepers, actively shaping journalistic practice and reframing current events in reference to the past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study seeks to examine the institutional and legal frameworks supporting the digitisation of records and archives at two selected state universities in Zimbabwe. The digitisation of records and archives has become a de-facto process at all state universities around the world as the move from paper-based to cloud-based records storage takes centre stage. In Zimbabwe, state universities, apart from their own legislative Acts, operate under the statutory requirements of the National Archives of Zimbabwe Act (Chapter 25:06) of 1986 as amended by Act 22 of 2001. It is a fact that the digitisation of records and archives is a new concept to most records officers and archivists at state universities. This paradigm shift of moving from paper-based to digitised records management has been coded as a revolution which--whether we like it or not--has dominated and challenged traditional paper record-keeping systems. The first objective of the study is to find out the institutional obligations of state universities in digitising records and archives. The second objective is to ascertain the legal framework for the digitisation of records and archives. The study adopts a qualitative research design. It draws data from interviews with key participants at the two selected state universities. Qualitative data were organised into broad themes, and the content was reported in a narrative form. The study used an emergent framework to code and categorise the data and group them into themes. A myriad of challenges was unearthed, which were found to potentially inhibit the digitisation of records and archives. The study, therefore, concludes that although state universities have taken steps towards supporting the digitisation of records and archives, more still needs to be done for an effective digitisation process. It recommends that state universities should first address issues of legislation, policies and skills for the effective digitisation of records and archives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The governance and development history of the Yellow River is an important part of Chinese history. Many historical documents and archives have been produced around the governance and development of the Yellow River as well as modern information resources such as databases and pictures, which together constitute a special collection of cultural heritage resources of the Yellow River Governance Landscape. In this paper, a literature search was conducted and unique resources collected for the construction of the Yellow River Governance Landscape, including the main literature, archives, pictures, databases, and other resources. Experts identified the concept and relevant resources of the Yellow River Governance Landscape, and librarians constructed the special collection. The future direction of digitization and database construction for the Yellow River Governance Landscape resources are also discussed. The special resources of the Yellow River Governance Landscape will help to increase the discipline collections and special collections of university libraries, provide resources for multidisciplinary teaching and research, and help to digitize and build databases of Yellow River Governance Landscape resources in the future as well as provide the content basis for open access and sharing of digital resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Digital collections are becoming more commonplace at libraries, archives and museums around the world, creating potential for improved accessibility to information that may otherwise remain hidden and further support for intellectual exploration. As a result of the growing potential for digital collections to inform and influence, the conversation surrounding ethics and digital collections needs to be continually examined and adapted as technologies evolve, user expectations change and digital information plays an increasing role in our everyday lives. In this context, this paper presents an overview of multifaceted ethical realities that impact the how, why and what digital information is created, accessed and preserved. Design/methodology/approach: Written from the perspective of a digital collections librarian, this paper relies on existing research in presenting ethical considerations and complements that research with professional observations in providing subsequent reflections on addressing challenges in the age of digital information. Findings: There are and should be considerations given to not only what information is contained in a given collection, but also how that information is selected, accessed and consumed by the public. The conclusions offered are designed to provoke reflection on the evolving and interconnected nature of information and ethics in the context of digital collections. Originality/value: Information ethics is multifaceted, with one of those facets relating directly to digital collections. This paper demonstrates that digital collections are more complex than simply a collection of digitized documents and photographs. As the field of information management continually evolves and adapts, so, too, do the ethical realizations identified in this paper, all of which go beyond the (virtual) walls of a library, archive or museum, and carry the potential to have a long-term impact concerning information and its integrity, equity and access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Sherman Indian Museum's rich collection documents the student experience, institutional culture, and community history of one of the oldest offreservation American Indian boarding schools in the United States still in operation. Efforts to better understand the complex and layered history of these schools are regularly confronted with limited and scattered histories where significant gaps in the narrative exist. This paper details the cross-institutional collaboration to process and digitize the museum's collection for increased accessibility, focusing on the partnership formed between an Indigenous and non-Indigenous institution and the steps taken to create one of the premier online digital collections documenting the boarding school experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses a photographic plate archive of the Ulugh Beg Astronomical Institute (UBAI) of the Uzbek Academy of Sciences, the history of photometric observations, the current state of photometric plates, and the process of their digitization. We will talk about telescopes used for observations, their characteristics and observations. In addition, we will also talk about the preparation of photographic plates for scanning. Also, the work carried out in the "UBAI-SHAO scientific and technical project" on digitization of photographic plates in the UBAI archive at the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (SHAO) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and future work will be reviewed and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focusing on the transatlantic market for Irish literary archives, this essay examines the symbolic weight attached to the role of such archives in the construction of Irish national heritage. Tracing the circulation of collections (such as the Gonne-Yeats Letters, the correspondence of Seamus Heaney, and Joyce's drafts of Ulysses) between Ireland and America, this article assesses the currency of literary archives in various locations. Finally, it considers whether the institutional location of these archives is still relevant given the digitization and globalization of the knowledge economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital cultural archives and databases are promising an era of heritage democratization and an enhancement of the role of arts in everyday cultures. It is hoped that mass digitization initiatives in many corners of the world can facilitate the secure preservation of human cultural heritage, with easy access and diverse ways for creative reuse. Understanding the dialogic processes within these increasingly vast databases necessitates a dynamic conceptualization of data they contain. The paper argues that this can be found in Juri Lotman's cultural semiotic notion of text and text's functions in culture. It elaborates on the three key characteristics of text – expression, boundary, and structure – as manifested within the digital semiosphere. At the same time, the textual dialogues within digital archives are increasingly conditioned by metadata, which is hereby conceptualized as metalanguage inducing a modeling effect on archived texts and defining their possible sphere of dynamics. To balance the explanations of creative operations of digital archives, the paper also demonstrates their auto-communicative mechanisms for facilitating cultural continuities and stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As many archives increase digital access to their holdings, there is a need for a clear policy on how institutions can ethically include sexual materials in digital collections. These materials are vital to building inclusive collections, but they also deserve special consideration in balancing access with privacy. Such materials, particularly those with reference to sexual or gender-based violence, deserve a specific ethical framework because of their unique ability to cause continued harm to both subjects and users. This paper proposes the application of the radical empathy framework developed by Michelle Caswell and Marika Cifor (2016) to determine consent to digitize the materials and discusses some examples where this framework might apply. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on manuscripts from early medieval Septimania and Catalonia has become quite sophisticated, but significant and detailed work remains to be done. The ongoing digitization of thousands of manuscript fragments, preserved especially in public, ecclesiastical, and private archives and libraries in Catalonia, will furnish a rich collection of unknown items that will allow for the reconstruction of lost testimonies of the region's religious culture from the ninth century onwards. This paper shows how modern fragmentology, based on systematic digitization and comparison of scattered pieces, enables us to rediscover and write the history of the Carolingian homiletic collections in the south-western periphery of the Carolingian empire formed by Septimania and Catalonia—both in general and in the specific case of the autochthonous Homiliary of Luculentius. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Die Digitalisierung von Gesellschaft und Arbeit stellt neue Herausforderungen an Dokumentation, Archivierung und erneute Nutzung von Informationen und Medien durch große und kleine Einrichtungen. Zur erfolgreichen Bewältigung dieser Herausforderungen tragen Vernetzung und Qualifizierung erheblich bei. In diesen Bereichen ist nestor aktiv. Der Beitrag informiert über Geschichte, Reichweite und Angebote des Kompetenznetzwerks nestor und berichtet über aktuelle Entwicklungen während der Pandemie. Insbesondere werden die Arbeitsgruppen, Publikationen und Veranstaltungs- sowie Qualifizierungsangebote des Netzwerks vorgestellt. Der Beitrag ruft zudem zur Beteiligung im Netzwerk auf. The digitization of society and work sees institutions faced with new challenges for the documentation, archiving and re-use of information and media. Networking and qualifying measures contribute significantly to successfully meeting these challenges. In all these fields, nestor operates. The article outlines history, scope and offerings of the competence network nestor as well as recent developments during the pandemic. Working groups, publications, workshop and qualification programmes are introduced. The paper also calls on network partners to contribute and participate in the project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of ICT in Muzical Field / Tehnologii Informatice si de Comunicatie in Domeniul Muzical is the property of Tehnologii Informatice si de Comunicatie in Domeniul Muzical / ICT in Musical Field and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article contains a transcription of a new letter recently acquired by Keats-Shelley House, Rome. The letter, written partly by Mary Shelley and partly by her son, Percy Florence, is dated 11 February 1843 from Florence and addressed to Julian Robinson, Percy's Cambridge friend. The Shelleys spent the winter of 1842–3 in Florence in the course of their second continental tour, recounted in Parts II and III of Mary Shelley's Rambles in Germany and Italy, in 1840, 1842, and 1843 (1844). The letter complements the travelogue by offering a glimpse of their daily life abroad as members of the local foreign community. We thus learn of Percy's regular but unenthusiastic attendance at the carnival balls and his lack of interest in female society, to his mother's chagrin. Her portion of the letter further reveals her financial difficulties and strained relationship with Laura Galloni d'Istria, Mrs Mason's daughter, with whom Mary Shelley had been reunited after twenty years. Both mother and son also comment on the much-opposed marriage to Henry Hunt of the daughter of Jane Hogg (formerly Jane Williams), Dina. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In addition to central institutions such as state archives, many other types of archives that are covered by archival legislation have recently been increasingly promoted and developed, such as private archives and special collections of individual institutions, community archives, etc. However, the fact is that due to various obstacles many such places are not officially registered in the mentioned categories, even though they correspond to them in terms of character and activity. Such archives, whether they are registered or only operate nominally in one of the legislative frameworks, often differ from state archives in the priorities according to which they define their methodology. For example, many adapt the methodology of describing archival records and working with users in accordance with the logic and dynamics of the environment in which they exist. In addition, in such places, the roles of the creator and owner of the material are mostly intertwined. Historically speaking, special collection departments were more focused on internal users, often also the creators of the materials, than on external users -- individuals, groups, institutions or associations. However, in the last few decades, the number of external users of private and special, especially research archives, has been increasing, which is why it was necessary to re-examine the dynamics of the archival staff's relationship with all types of users and propose certain improvements. In the context of contemporary digital technologies and social networks, special librarians and archivists in special collections get to know users more and more thoroughly and readily respond to their specific requests. Furthermore, they also try to gather potentially interested individuals and groups, thus creating new communities of users. In any case, the appreciation of the implicit knowledge of users is valuable as a pledge in the process of ending the binary opposition of business and research value of archives. This is most visible in the example of community archives, which rely very directly on small stories. The analysis of the work of the Special Collection of Ethnographic Materials of the Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Research in Zagreb, Croatia, served here as an example of those services that function as informal special research archives and were created for their needs by the parent institutions. It was at the same time an example of a special collection that takes over evaluation criteria from other specific forms of archives, such as community archives, precisely recognizing the aforementioned qualities as a bridge to a more inclusive archival activity. The relationship between employees and users was examined through the lens of different methodologies, projects and cooperation in approaching archival records. Special emphasis was placed on the contemporary models of community involvement. Based on the review of the record lists of external users over a period of 60 years and the management of social networks, it was shown to what extent the characteristic approach to archival records and users, more precisely, their presentation and dissemination, affects the specificity of the formal and legal status of the Institute's Special Collection. The paper also concludes that social networks are not only important for promotion, dissemination and networking, but that due to the already mentioned inclusion they represent a completely new environment. Certain individuals within this environment transform from passive followers into a new, modern type of users of institutions within the GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums) community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents the history of the development of the Budapest Time Machine (www.hungaricana.hu/en/budapest-time-machine), which started from the vision of the Venice Time Machine, despite the fact that it was never realised, but was the basis for the European Time Machine Initiative. The Budapest Time Machine was a visionary phenomenon from the moment of its debut, and it has maintained this position ever since: one of the flagships of the international Time Machine initiative from the very beginning. The development was launched by the Budapest City Archives in 2017. The background database of the Budapest Time Machine is the Hungarian public collection portal called Hungaricana, on which the Budapest City Archives continuously publishes a large amount of digitised archival sources (maps, blueprints, notarial deeds etc.). The interface of the Budapest Time Machine -- whose first version was developed in 2017 provides digitized and georeferenced maps of Budapest, synchronized with each other using GPS coordinates, and vectorised historical maps of the city's development in five different time sections (1837, 1872, 1908, 1916, 1938). The platform also allows browsing through historical documents related to the buildings, their owners or their former inhabitants: building plans, land registry inserts showing the owners, notarial deeds showing legal and administrative transactions of the period and the network of the inhabitants. Archival photographs and postcards are also easily searchable, either by address or by browsing the map. The Budapest Time Machine was completely renewed at the end of 2022. The advantage of the new version is that, unlike the previous version, it provides a single interface for accessing the data, and the maps can now be viewed in 3D. An important innovation is the publication of 3D historical reconstructions of some 30 buildings in cooperation with the University of Óbuda. The Budapest Time Machine is an example of collaboration between public collections and academic research, and we plan to include data created by NGOs in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay examines the Dutch Textile Trade Project's use of the Dutch West India Company archives in the context of archival sources for the Dutch colony of New Netherland, which included parts of New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Connecticut (1621 to 1664). While the digitization of the WIC's New Netherland Papers has provided scholars with invaluable access to information about the former Dutch colony, it has also placed undue weight on this elite, semi-private collection of documents at the expense of other archival collections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digitization has increased the accessibility of archival holdings. At the same time, digitization not only changes the relationship between the archivist and the researcher, but it also changes the way records are described. The author argues that, in order to remain relevant, archives need to different programs and develop into centers of expertise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study we investigate the implementation and challenges of accessing archives in the digital age. Through an online survey and expert interviews, data were collected from archival institutions, professional users, and civil society organizations in all Council of Europe member states. The findings reveal that digitization has had a positive impact on document accessibility, providing convenience, reducing workload, and improving user access. However, only a small portion of archival holdings have been digitized, highlighting the need for further efforts in this area. Data protection and copyright present significant obstacles, with the European General Data Protection Regulation leading to access restrictions and legal uncertainties. Preservation, interoperability, and organization of records pose challenges in the digital realm, and while artificial intelligence shows promise in automating metadata creation and identifying sensitive materials, concerns about algorithmic biases and the need for additional checks are highlighted. To enhance accessibility, user-friendly interfaces, cooperation among memory preserving institution, and outreach to new user groups are crucial, which can ensure the effective preservation and accessibility of digital collections in the digital age. We provide insights for policy-making and archival institutions in navigating the evolving landscape of accessibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Croatian archival regulations (Archives and Archival Institutions Act and Ordinance on the Management of Records Outside the Archival Institutions) prescribe the procedure of the verification of compatibility of rules, technologies and procedures for conversion of archival materials into digital form. The procedure is carried out by the Croatian State Archives as the central state archives in the Republic of Croatia. It concerns a complex procedure of verification of a specific IT system for digitization which requires acceptance and implementation of appropriate standards and norms from the public authorities, other bodies or individuals in order for digitized records to be transferred in a certain way to authorised archives and consequently ensure their long-term protection. The paper provides answers to several current issues from conformity check procedures that can help public authorities and other interested parties in reconciliation of business processes and preparing documentation necessary for obtaining a certificate of conformity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I address the following research questions in the context of having built a research data repository to safeguard cultural research data. How can the PARADISEC team ensure the records we create in the course of our research will exist into the future and remain citable? How can our research data be made available for a wider public, most importantly for the people recorded and their descendants? How can we prepare our students for this new approach to curation of primary research data so that they can build good methodology into their normal research practice, with much more productive outcomes? You wonʼt know what you had till itʼs gone: analog recordings and cultural restitution in the 21st century [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Russian Ephemera Collection (late 1980s–1990s) at Harvard Library is a monumental primary source collection for the study of the late Soviet and post-Soviet era. It was acquired in the 1990s along with the collection of Independent and Post-Soviet Press, but remained "hidden" until 2013–2014, when it was cataloged and digitized. Digitization played a role not only in the preservation but also in the discovery of the collection. The ephemera cover various subjects, ranging from purely political (elections, the 1991 coup d'état attempt, rallies, political parties and politicians, independence movements, ethnic conflict) to cultural, religious and business-related topics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of History / Habaršy Tarihi Seriâsy is the property of Al-Farabi Kazakh National University and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper is intended to help librarians and archivists who are involved in digitization work choose optical character recognition (OCR) software. The paper provides an introduction to OCR software for digitization projects, and shares the method we developed for easily evaluating the effectiveness of OCR software on resources we are digitizing. We tested three major OCR programs (Adobe Acrobat, ABBYY FineReader, Tesseract) for accuracy on three different digitized texts from our archives and special collections at the University of Western Ontario. Our test was divided into two parts: a word accuracy test (to determine how searchable the final documents were), and a test with a screen reader (to determine how accessible the final documents were). We share our findings from the tests and make recommendations for OCR work on digitized documents from archives and special collections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since 1970, decametric observations of the Sun and Jupiter have been acquired on a daily basis from the radio observatory of Nançay, France. The resulting database now forms the worldwide largest set of low frequency observations of the Solar Corona between 10 and 100 MHz and of the Jovian magnetosphere between 10 and 40 MHz. The Nançay Decameter Interferometer (NDI), a two-antenna interferometer, acquired pioneer observations from 1970 to 1978, using analog radio receivers tested on the Arecibo giant radiotelescope. The large Nançay Decameter array (NDA), a phased array of 144 helical antennas, was then constructed in the late 1970s as a ground-based support to the Voyager mission and started routine observations in January 1978 in replacement of the NDI, using similar spectrometers. The NDA is still in operation today and its observations, recorded in a digital format since 1990, are public and daily made accessible to the heliospheric and magnetospheric communities at https://www.obs-nancay.fr/reseau-decametrique/. Before 1990, though, the Nançay decametric observations were recorded on analog devices, such as 35-mm films, magnetic tapes and other paper supports, physically archived at the Observatory of Paris, on its site of the Observatory of Meudon, where they could only be accessed on demand. The NDA team recently undertook a multi-year effort to inventory all the Nançay decametric archives, to refurbish and digitize them in order to preserve and promote this historical data collection, most notably by extending the current public database over the 1970–1990 time interval. We digitized the full collection of 35-mm films, corresponding to a total film length of ∼ 45. 5 km, with a specific high resolution scanner. Each roll was scanned by a series of pixel-to-pixel contiguous images recorded in TIF format with adequate metadata and naming convention. The final ∼ 40 Tb data volume was archived at Paris Astronomical Data Centre and the physical films were refurbished to be archived in a perennial way. We also digitized the associated observations sheets. Finally, we took advantage of this project to also digitize a sample of 35-mm films extracted from four other historical solar data collections hosted at the Observatory of Paris and dealing with two distinct Nançay radiotelescopes and two Lyot heliographs located at the Observatories of Meudon and Haute-Provence. The digitized, documented, Nançay decametric archives have been publicly released to the community in 2020 at http://archives-decametriques.obspm.fr. After having described the instruments, the data collections and the digitization pipeline, this articles ends with a few scientific case studies, focussing on the search for Jupiter-satellite decametric emissions. For instance, the digitized NDA archives suggest the presence of Gan-A and B emissions, while these were first reported in 2018. This work is a concrete example of how historical astronomical measurements can be preserved and archived along the IAU recommendation, to the benefit of the astronomical community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study discusses the process of digitizing the Dutch East India Company (VOC) treasures archive from the 17th century to the mid-20th century during the Dutch East Indies colonial government (1818–1942). This VOC archive has been recognized by UNESCO as a world historical heritage, namely, the Memory of the World Register, in March 2004. The National Archives of the Republic of Indonesia (ANRI), as a national archival institution, is responsible for opening these archives online for the public, students, scientists, and all those in need around the world. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out a digitization process for easy access to the VOC archives. The purpose of this study was to see how the process of digitizing the VOC archives was carried out and what obstacles were encountered in the process. This research method uses a qualitative approach with a case study method through a narrative description of data analysis that focuses on digitizing activities carried out by the ANRI, especially in the Reproduction and Archive Digitization Sub-Directorate. Data were collected through observation of digitization activities, interviews with archivists involved, analysis of digitizing documents, and literature studies. The results that can be reviewed are the process of digitizing the VOC archives, starting from the archive identification stage, metadata preparation, archive digitization, digitizing quality control, digital archive storage, and making reports of the activity of digitization. The digitized archives are presented on the website of "Sejarah Nusantara-Arsip Nasionalthat", which can be freely accessed by the public. The conclusion obtained is that the digitization of the VOC archives has been carried out well according to the standard procedures previously established and the practice theory of archive digitization in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The proliferation of digitized manuscript sources has opened up a wide range of applications for using primary sources in undergraduate learning environments. This article describes a learning activity that simulates the process of making archival sources accessible to the general public. In the simulation, students work with digital copies of manuscripts from the Moravian Archives. After a brief description of the activity, the article offers reflection on the author's goals for the exercise and responses from students who found this simulation to be a positive learning experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corporate annual reports provide a snapshot of a company's operations and financial status. Reviewing and comparing years of annual reports can provide a rich history of knowledge on a corporation. Preserving, storing, and digitizing Canadian annual reports has been a mission of the C.B. "Bud" Johnston Library in London, Ontario, Canada. In late 2019 when Western Libraries migrated to a new library services platform, Alma, there was a new opportunity to catalog and provide access to the digitized annual reports collection. This article describes a decade long plan to digitize the print collection by library staff and a subsequent project to provide online access to the digitized content. Included is a discussion of cataloging methods, staffing, training, inventory control, and hosting solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Municipal Libraries have a significant number of rare and valuable publications as well as unique archival material. Until recently, the rarity of this material imposed on its management a series of prohibitions that made research difficult. The adoption of digital technology in the field of Closed Collections has come to change the data and facilitate research, simulating it to a large extent with that of open access collections. The digitization and electronic cataloging of these books was deemed necessary, not only because it contributed to the substantial, albeit virtual, enrichment of the electronic catalog of the Municipal Libraries, but also because it digitally saved an extremely distressed printed material of maximum importance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last couple of decades, libraries, archives, museums and other cultural institutions have begun to scan archival documents and develop digital collections of analog-born materials. Theories of the archive politicize archival practices and highlight the mediating role of both archivists and preservation technologies, and recent accounts of the digital archive underscore both its pervasiveness and its algorithmic post-humanism. Both strands, however, ignore scanning – a human–computer interaction that shapes the ways in which archival sources will be preserved. Drawing on STS, HCI and HMC scholarship, this ethnography opens the black box of scanning at the National Library of Israel. The analysis focuses on three "breakdowns" that involve the handling of a torn photo, an ancient map and a scan robot. We show that instead of an automated process in which machines convert materials into copies, archival scanning is a symbolic human–computer interaction that produces digital objects with varying relationships to the analog originals. We discuss the ramifications of these insights to the social study of archival technology and future memory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whilst the importance of internet-related technologies and digitization practices to economic performance is well documented, little is known about the long-term effects of the early adoption of such technologies. We use novel, geolocated data about the volume of online content from the Internet Archive to approximate the active engagement with digital economic activities. Using panel-data methods, we find significant positive and long-lasting effects of online content creation in 2000 on subsequent regional productivity levels up to 16 years later. Our findings highlight the sizeable effects of the digital economy that policy-makers should consider when developing future rollout strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In democratic constitutional states, public archives have the duty to enable access to historical information of state action in order to help secure the traceability of politics and the accountability of authorities. However, this is not an obvious statement and it has not always and everywhere been true. Th is paper traces the history of the access services of the Swiss Federal Archives (SFA) since 1848. Drawing on the concept of street-level bureaucracy, it focuses on face-to-face interactions between users and archivists in the reading room. In this vein, it provides an organisational history from bottom-up. It argues that the opening of access and increasing numbers of users intensified the bureaucratization of access procedures. Within this context, particular attention is paid to the digitization of the access interface and its bearing on (reading room) encounters of users and archivists.

Existing research offers fearful conclusions on the use of online archival collections, finding that historians ignore and overlook the limitations of digital sources. However, an attitudinal case study at Newcastle University contradicts this consensus. This article discusses this study's detailed findings, determining that historians and library professionals demonstrate abundant and nuanced awareness of issues relating to 'digital selectivity'. Nevertheless, the interviewees suggested that this does not radically undermine their practice. The study also revealed compelling aspects of digital selectivity not currently observed in existing research, including the effects of career stage and the importance of cooperation with library professionals. While the existing literature provides appropriate and prudent concerns, it lacks tangible evidence pointing to a widespread phenomenon of poor digital historical practice. The article closes by recommending further research into historians' digital information-seeking behaviour, but argues that standardized metadata practices must come first. Limitations, including the absence of rigorous quantitative data, must be resolved before a fuller appreciation for digital historical practice is developed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]