Tending the Garden or Harvesting the Fields: Digital Preservation and the UNESCO Charter on the Preservation of the Digital Heritage

摘要

The UNESCO Charter on the Preservation of Digital Heritage,adopted in October 2003, is important for affirming the role of(national) heritage institutions and extending existing systems forpreservation of documentary heritage to cover digital materials. Thisapproach has distinct advantages, but has also been criticized for takingtoo narrow a view of the dynamic diversity of the digital environment,particularly as found on the Web. To understand what digitalheritage is, it is useful to look at the current debate on preservationof intangible heritage, as both share a number of characteristics.The charter is examined in the context of UNESCO programs onculture to indicate its relevance for UNESCO???s mission and to pointto political aspects of digital preservation that cannot be ignored.