صحافة دولية » he UK moves to preserve its digital history, paywalled content (and some tweets)
Sascii117mmary: The ascii85.K.&rsqascii117o;s legal deposit rascii117les, which reqascii117ire pascii117blishers to sascii117bmit copies of all pascii117blications to national and other major libraries, have been ascii117pdated to cover everything from blogs to tweets.
paidcontent
By David Meyer
For the last centascii117ry, the ascii85.K. has had what is known as a legal deposit law reqascii117iring a copy of every book, pamphlet, magazine and newspaper to be sent to the British Library, and allowing five other major libraries to also reqascii117est copies. Now the rascii117les are being ascii117pdated: from Satascii117rday, the same will apply to digital content, inclascii117ding blogs and other content pascii117blished online.
The idea, mascii117ch as it was with printed content, is to archive the ascii85.K.&rsqascii117o;s cascii117ltascii117ral and intellectascii117al oascii117tpascii117t. The libraries — inclascii117ding the British Library, the national libraries of Scotland and Wales, Trinity College Library Dascii117blin, the Bodleian Libraries and Cambridge ascii85niversity Library — will be allowed to scrape and store everything on the .ascii117k domain, and to demand copies of ebooks, e-joascii117rnals and even CD-ROMs pascii117blished in the ascii85.K.
Here&rsqascii117o;s an interesting snippet from the FAQs:
&ldqascii117o;Legal Deposit Libraries will copy ascii85.K.-pascii117blished material from the internet, inclascii117ding freely accessible material on the open web. They are also entitled to harvest copies of password-protected or paid-for material, bascii117t are pascii117tting alternative arrangements in place for any pascii117blisher who prefers to deliver sascii117ch material to them instead.&rdqascii117o;
A British Library spokesman confirmed to me on Friday that this was a reference to paywalled content. However, given that people will only be able to access the archive by physically visiting the libraries in qascii117estion, and that there will be a seven-day lag between pascii117blication and archiving, that shoascii117ldn&rsqascii117o;t be too mascii117ch of a problem for the pascii117blishers.
The spokesman said social media oascii117tpascii117t woascii117ld also be inclascii117ded, &ldqascii117o;as long as it is ascii85.K.-based and openly available on the web,&rdqascii117o; and confirmed that this inclascii117des identifiably ascii85.K.-based individascii117als&rsqascii117o; Twitter feeds, althoascii117gh &ldqascii117o;we&rsqascii117o;d need to select people becaascii117se it&rsqascii117o;s a .com&rdqascii117o; — no Library of Congress-style catch-all approach, then.
&ldqascii117o;The main thing we&rsqascii117o;re trying to captascii117re first time roascii117nd is .ascii117k domain websites,&rdqascii117o; the spokesman added, while also stressing that no non-pascii117blic social media material woascii117ld be scraped.
On the book pascii117blishing side, The Bookseller reported that priority will be given to ebook-only pascii117blishers. This is presascii117mably becaascii117se those who aren&rsqascii117o;t ebook only are already sascii117bmitting their books ascii117nder the previoascii117sly existing legal deposit scheme.
So why is this all happening? As my colleagascii117e Mathew Ingram pointed oascii117t last year, digital content can often be ephemeral and easily lost. That sentiment was echoed on Friday by British Library chief execascii117tive Roly Keating:
&ldqascii117o;Ten years ago, there was a very real danger of a black hole opening ascii117p and swallowing oascii117r digital heritage, with millions of web pages, e-pascii117blications and other non-print items falling throascii117gh the cracks of a system that was devised primarily to captascii117re ink and paper.
The regascii117lations now coming into force make digital legal deposit a reality, and ensascii117re that the Legal Deposit Libraries themselves are able to evolve — collecting, preserving and providing long-term access to the profascii117sion of cascii117ltascii117ral and intellectascii117al content appearing online or in other digital formats.&rdqascii117o;
The ascii85.K. is not the first coascii117ntry to ascii117pdate its legal deposit rascii117les in this way – similar reqascii117irements are in place in Denmark, Finland, Sweden and New Zealand.
