IFLA WLIC 2013 Paper: “Who is Looking After Your e-Journals? Telling Tales About The Keepers Registry & Your Digital Shelves”

We’re continuing to share a selection of papers to be presented at the upcoming IFLA World Library and Information Congress taking place next month in Singapore.
The following paper is our third selection. Our first two selected WLIC 2013 papers are linked at the bottom of this post.

Today’s Selection

Title

Who is looking after your e-journals? Telling Tales About The Keepers Registry & Your Digital Shelves

Authors

Peter Burnhill
EDINA, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
Françoise Pelle
ISSN International Centre
Paris, France 

Source

IFLA Library

Abstract

The key task for research libraries is to ensure access to the scholarly and cultural record.
A significant and growing proportion of that is in digital format and much is found on the Web – and not on the shelves of libraries. This raises important questions about the archival responsibility of  libraries and publishers. Our purpose is to report on the current situation of e-journal preservation,  on what is being archived and what is at risk of loss. We also indicate strategies that can be  considered to meet an international challenge that requires recognition of mutual inter-dependence  across the globe. The literature that is consulted and required by researchers in one country will  often have been written and published in another country.
The first (and easiest) priority for research libraries is to focus on e-journals and take prompt and strategic action, both to avoid loss in the short term and to establish means to assess progress towards the (achievable) goal of ensuring that there is complete and effective e-preservation plans for all of our e-journal content. This is assisted by The Keepers Registry, http://thekeepers.org, which provides a lens onto the extent of e-journal archiving as the leading archiving agencies report what  they have ingested. The sustainability of archiving activity, and the means to monitor that activity, is of major strategic importance.
A related priority is to tackle the variety of ‘serial issues’ that can improve the effectiveness of archiving and monitoring. These include identification (e.g. ISSN and ISSN-L) of all types of continuing resources, particularly journals but also ongoing ‘integrating resources’ such as databases and Web sites; the consistent naming and identification of publishers (e.g. ISNI); and the continuing need for a universal holdings statement for assurance that each and every volume and issue has been successfully archived.

Direct to Full Text Paper (12 pages; PDF)
Direct to The Keepers Registry

Previous WLIC 2013 Conference Paper Selections

• Conference Paper Reports on a Study of Emerging Technologies Librarians

• MOOCs and the Library: Engaging with Evolving Pedagogy

Filed under: Academic Libraries, Associations and Organizations, Companies (Publishers/Vendors), Journal Articles, Libraries, News, Preservation, Reports