Economic Sustainability in a Digital Preservation Context

The set of business, social, technological, and policy mechanisms that 1) encourage the gathering of important information assets into digital preservation systems, and 2) support the indefinite persistence of the digital preservation systems, thus securing access to and use of the information assets into the long-term future.

Economically sustainable digital preservation requires:

• Recognition of the benefits of preservation on the part of key decision-makers, as part of a process of selecting digital materials for long-term retention;
• Appropriate incentives to induce decision-makers to act in the public interest;
• Mechanisms to secure an ongoing allocation of resources, both within and across organizations, to digital preservation activities;
• Efficient use of limited preservation resources;
• Appropriate organization and governance of digital preservation activities.