The passion with which people are engaging in the "compliance mistakes news
article" discussion has reminded me that I have had some heretical thoughts
lately and I'm going to share them at the risk of being burned at the stake.



What if we could store an entire year's electronic records, including
emails, on/in something that takes up the physical space of the head of a
pin?



And what if we had search/access software that was so powerful and intuitive
that we could locate the items we needed within seconds...every time!



And what if...before it was stored each item was auto-converted to PDF or
some other long term format?



And what if...before it was converted and stored each item was given a swag
of compliant metadata (maybe with no user intervention needed)?



If (when?) it does become cheap and easy to store everything forever...will
we still argue for retention/disposal schedules and sentencing/disposal
programs?



In my days as an archivist I had many an argument with passionate
researchers and historians who thought it impossible for me or my colleagues
to make decisions about which 1% (or 5% or 25%) of the government records I
appraised would be useful for research in 10 years or 50 years or 100 years
because I couldn't possibly predict the future.  My argument was
always..."well of course it would be nice to keep everything but that is
simply physically & financially impossible so we do the best we can".



How will an archivist argue with a historian when the above scenario becomes
a real possibility?



How will a records manager argue with the IT manager that we need a disposal
program?



Or will we finally be able to stop arguing?



Cheers, Bernadette, in a contemplative mood this morning



Bernadette Bean

Records Management Strategist

Department of Health (Sth Australian Government)

bus ph: 8226 6154

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