California Polytechnic State University invites participation in a study entitled "Software Preservation for Cultural Heritage”, which is part of an IMLS-funded project to establish a Software Preservation Network. The study aims to better understand cultural heritage practices and experiences surrounding long-term preservation and access to digital primary resources stored in proprietary file formats.
While the cultural heritage community has developed tools and workflows for bitstream preservation, the community lacks empirical data regarding the experiences and efforts of cultural heritage repositories to access material stored in proprietary file formats during appraisal, accessioning, description, and reference activities.
As part of this survey, participants will also be invited to opt-in for a follow-up semi-structured interview regarding proprietary software challenges. Anonymized data from the study will be made available to the profession and software rights holders, along with analysis of current trends and possibilities for future research.
The survey will last around 2 minutes and can be found here:
Further information on the Software Preservation Network project can be found here:
Jessica Meyerson, Digital Archivist, Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Zach Vowell, Digital Archivist, Robert E. Kennedy Library, California Polytechnic State University: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.