Stephen Cohen said "As for retaining records post-departure, what seems to be the situation is that in more than a few situations, someone left on the heels of a legal hold with IT wiping the drive and personal space a tad too soon. This is another issue of communicating holds more expediently which I am also working on."

This is where the recent decision by Judge Scheindlin (concerning which Peter Kurilecz has posted MANY references) can be helpful. Call it "Litigation Holds for Dummies".

As far as the longevity issue goes, I completely agree with Jesse's comments, and would only add that, IMHO, the most important factors in so-called "digital preservation" are NOT the technology factors (tricky as they are), but rather the human and the institutional and social factors.

Humans, human institutions, and human societies are really terrible at actively-preserving things, and active preservation is what would be required to successfully-preserve computer data.

It should be clear by now that merely selecting high-quality computer data storage media and putting them on a shelf is not a viable approach to the preservation of computer data for the long term (anything greater than the traditional definition of a human generation, 25 years).

Best regards.

Fred
===================================================================
Frederic J. Grevin
Deputy Commissioner and Chief Information Officer
The City of New York,
Department of Records
Email: [log in to unmask]
Land phone: 212-788-8615
Cell phone: 917-902-2462
Fax:  212-788-8614
www.nyc.gov/records
31 Chambers Street
New York, NY 10007
USA

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