Workbook on Digital Private Papers > Working with record creators > The nature of personal digital archives
The nature of personal digital archives
A special relationship: why curators should talk to creators of personal digital material
The information found in personal archives gives readers a unique, human perspective into historical events. The wealth of correspondence and papers produced by actors and observers provide details which the official record cannot. Letters, diaries, collections of press cuttings, photographs and drafts which were not created for public consumption are amongst the most valuable historical sources. These sources are increasingly created in a digital format and because of this many records have already been lost, or are in danger of being lost. Personal archives are especially vulnerable because they sit outside organisational structures which could provide for their maintenance by imposing standards or policies relating to digital record keeping.
Record creators are not always aware that even the short-term survival of their digital material is at risk due to media degradation, corruption or accidental loss. Most individuals only have limited support from IT professionals; any technical support they receive tends to be informal advice from IT-literate friends or acquaintances. Often record creators have little understanding of the technology which underlies and facilitates their digital record keeping, and no great interest in delving into its complexities. They may also be unaware of the potential significance of their digital records and manage them in a haphazard or inconsistent fashion, deleting historically valuable records when they have outlived current needs.
By working with creators of historically significant personal archives curators can increase the rate of survival of these valuable resources. Even in the early stages of the Paradigm project it was possible to discern changes in the record keeping behaviour of politicians' staff working with Paradigm archivists. The staff of one politician decided to place weekly diary briefings in a folder rather than deleting them once their immediate usefulness had expired. Several participants remarked that they had never thought of the records they dealt with as having any long-term historical interest, but on reflection they appreciated the potential value of the material to historians and other researchers in the future. Such reflection is likely to lead to changes in record keeping behaviour and this can be extremely helpful for archivists - making the task of appraisal (see Chapter 04 Appraisal and disposal) much easier and resulting in a more complete historical record.
It is also worth noting that many of the paper records generated by politicians are at risk. Countless records without administrative value are routinely destroyed during the parliamentary recess. After a general election campaign, a change of brief, or the redrawing of a constituency boundary, destruction can be even more extensive. Other domains may be vulnerable to different changes, for example constant change in domains where project working is the norm. Once paper records reach the archive, however, their preservation is largely a passive exercise; management decisions regarding appropriate physical storage and access conditions can be applied in blanket fashion.
Maintaining contact with record creators over time is therefore of the utmost importance for archivists collecting personal digital archives. It may take years for record creators to develop enough trust in the repository to consider depositing their most sensitive or confidential papers. This obviously requires a commitment of staff time and resources on the part of the collecting institution; maintaining contact over a long period isn't easy, especially in the case of politicians' offices, where there is often a high turnover of staff.
Why is it important to preserve digital records digitally?
Where personal digital archives exist they should be preserved digitally, to retain their inherent qualities and relationships. While some page-oriented records lend themselves to printing, many would lose salient characteristics if transferred to paper. These important characteristics include formatting, relationships, intertextuality and other functionality.
Preserving records digitally will also allow archivists to preserve the 'original order' of personal archives, whilst also providing a functionality that enables users to rearrange the material by date, author, or other property. Full-text searching is another possibility which interests many researchers.
