Writing preservation policies might be a daunting task, but support is underway!

The SCAPE project has produced  a Catalogue of Preservation Policy elements, which is now available as a wiki. Here you will find an explanation of the SCAPE Policy Framework, consisting of 3 levels of policies. From high level or Guidance Policies to Preservation Procedure Policies to a very detailed level of policies useful for automatic workflows in preservation.

Preservation Procedure Policies, the intermediate level,  is designed to assist you to  create or update  your preservation policies. This level describes the approach an organisation intends to take in order to achieve their high level goals. It is this level that you can find in the Catalogue of Preservation Policy Elements. The catalogue offers a unique overview of policy elements that could be part of your preservation policy.

How does this work?

Each Guidance Policy has a set of related Preservation Procedure Policies. The details of these are described, using a template with a variety of information, for example a definition of the policy, the life cycle phase in which this policy will be relevant, a suggestion of who should be involved in creating the policy etc. For more inspiration you can also have a look at our collection of published preservation policies.

Although the SCAPE project is mainly focused on libraries, data centers and web archives, we believe that this Catalogue is also relevant for other disciplines with a preservation task.

We are convinced that, the Catalogue of Preservation Policy Elements will need to be updated based on new insights in digital preservation, even after the SCAPE project finishes in September. So we would like to invite you to send us your feedback, either by adding this in the Catalogue (each page offers an opportunity to add comments), or to send feedback to [email protected].

The final version of the Catalogue of Preservation Policy Elements was created by:  Barbara Sierman (National Library of the Netherlands),   Catherine Jones (Science and Technologies Facilities Council, UK) and Gry Elstrøm (State and University Library, Aarhus, Denmark)

Interested? Join the SCAPE Webinar on Preservation Policies on May 28, 14.00 hrs CET.