How to Archive an Event: Reflections on the Social Repository of Ireland

摘要

Reflecting on a feasibility study into archiving social media, this article traces how "events" are defined in various domains and contexts, and employs case studies to analyze key relationships between hashtags and events to provide a critical analysis of how archival events can be constructed out of social events. It provides an overview of the archival and curatorial considerations involved in defining and preserving a social media event, and outlines the technologies developed for the process of collecting, annotating, and preserving social media events. Overall, the article endeavors to reveal how pragmatic considerations, computational approaches and curatorial perspectives shape digital archives and historical narratives.