LOCKSS: ensuring access through time

Abstract

Some experts portray digital preservation as very expensive and too complicated for communities to do for themselves. They have a lot to gain by perpetrating this message and communities have a lot to lose by taking them at their word. Communities want to ensure post-cancellation access to content they have purchased; they want to ensure that a copy of the intellectual assets (fee and open access) in which they have invested through time resides in their own jurisdiction. The Stanford University LOCKSS Program (Lots Of Copies Keep Stuff Safe) helps communities build and preserve their own digital collections, an essential step to ensuring access over time.