thatcamp personal digital archiving
DESCRIPTION
Personal Digital Archiving presentation given by Matthew Strauss at THATCamp Pittsburgh 2013.TRANSCRIPT
Personal Digital Archiving
THATCamp Pittsburgh 2013
Today’s Lineup
Personal Digital Archiving Introduction
Recommendations for email, digital photos, social media
Heinz History Center
Historical Society of Western Pa. in 1879
Mission to preserve and provide access to history of the area.
Detre Library and Archives
Families, Businesses, community organizations
Diaries, photographs, letters, films & more
1700s-present day
Born Digital Material
In the future…
Digital images/video
Microsoft Office documents
Websites
Social Media
Paper vs. Digital
Papers and photographs can be neglected for periods of time
Digital files need to be actively managed over time
Threats to your files
Hard Drive Crashes
Not if, but when
No warning
Complete loss
Technological Obsolescence
1790 1990
Beware of proprietary formats!
Companies may discontinue support for older formats
Companies might go out of businesses
Try to keep your files in widely-supported, open formats
Cloud Insecurity
How long will these companies last?
Subject to changes in TOS
Privacy/Hacker concerns
Bit Rot
Store media degrades over time
Floppy disks, CDs/DVDs, flash memory
Files can become corrupted
Image credit - Digital Preservation Business Case Toolkit http://wiki.dpconline.org
INFORMATION OVERLOAD
Steps for Digital Archiving
Identify what you have and where you have it
Select what is important
Organize your files
Make copies
But first…
Make sure you have at least one backup, preferably in another location
Backing up is not the same as archiving
1. Identify Where Your Files Are
2. Decide what is Important
Keep what has enduring value
Highest quality version
Final drafts
Clutter impedes use!
3. Organize
Gather all of your files to single folder on your computer
Create a centralized Digital Archive folder
Use subfolders to organize by format
4. Make Copies
Regularly create external copies of your data
Store copies in different locations
Cloud storage
Consider a replacement schedule
Formats
Photographs
Facebook/Social Media
Where is your
email?
Online accounts
Email Client
Old accounts, devices
Select What is
Important
Look for emails that have long-term value
Download attachments
Export your email
IMAP and Mozilla Thunderbird
If using Outlook or Apple Mail, save files outside of these programs
Organize
Make use of folders, labels
Organize by date, topic, etc .
Export to your Archive folders .eml, mbox formats
Google Inactive Manager
In Gmail settings page
After inactivity, content sent to trusted contacts or deleted
Google Drive, Picassa, etc.
Images
Where are your Photos?
Decide What is Important
Selection process
Select highest quality version of your image
Convert raw files to more widely supported formats
Organize
Organize into folders
Add meaningful file names, tags and description.
Contextual info adds value to your images.
Metadata is your friend
EXIF
Geolocation
Some metadata might be software/site dependent (facebook)
Social Media
Letters + photo album + diary + scrapbooks + etc.
Community adds to your content
What you get:
Your Photos, with some metadata and comments
Chat, messages
Your wall info
Your “likes”
And also…
List of friends I’ve unfollowed
Pending friend requests
IP addresses used when logging in
Ad topics (A list of topics that you may be targeted against based on your stated likes, interests and other data you put in your timeline.)
What you don’t get
Photographs uploaded by other people
Certain metadata (tags, locations, titles, likes)
Facebook look and feel
Tweets can be downloaded through settings page
No lists of followers, those followed
Thank you!
Matthew StraussChief ArchivistDetre Library and ArchivesSenator John Heinz History Center