Issue 130 (2016)

G. Dručkus, director, K. Stanišauskė, department manager

Kaunas County Archives, Kaunas, Lithuania

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17721/1728-2640.2016.130.3.06

ARCHIVES IN DIGITAL ERA: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES

Objectives of the article: 1) to reveal certain aspects of relationship between archives, archivists and modern technologies; 2) to draw attention to certain Digital Era benefits and threats in order to encourage discussion about Archives' ambiguous situation in the face of the Digital Era; 3) to present personal understanding about Archive and archivist mission within the context of Digital Era. Approximately for fifteen last years various IT instruments are being used in the archives and records field. However, perhaps still hardly could somebody tell for sure in what extent are archives successful in their efforts to extract maximum benefits from Digital Era advantages. Maybe it is the very time to stop, look around and make evaluation of the completed part of the path in this direction; to evaluate current situation and decide what priority directions should be proceeded in the future. Are we sure that our efforts to deal with the Digital Era challenges result in archives' services improvement or just only in increase of the problems and costs related with documents' authenticity assurance, information preservation, re– use of public sector information, etc.? In spite of all Digital Era advantages we, archivists, should deeply and clearly comprehend responsibility for preserving our memory, our history. Once we agree that namely this is perhaps the main priority of archives on the whole then it will be easier for us to maintain a healthy attitude towards Digital Era provided opportunities which are, undoubtedly, wide range, impressive and in many cases helpful. On the other hand, we are facing a challenge what direction should be developed archive as a subject as well as human resources of our archivists community: either towards deeper professional understanding of the archival documents as such and documents' management or towards effective handling of information technologies? So, on one hand, in spite of Digital Era benefits and opportunities we shouldn't loose our core priority – preservation of documents, authentic information, etc. On the other hand, Digital Era provide unique opportunity and effective instruments for Archive's as a such transition from passive entity into active and society friendly subject capable to offer more wide spectrum of public services in order to deal successfully with the challenges of our dynamic contemporary society. With the help of high technologies Archive can become a good and convenient place to spend meaningfully the whole day for everybody in spite of their age, social status, etc. This perhaps might be the main archives' challenge within the context of Digital Era.

Key words: archives, Digital Era, modern technologies, challenges, preservation of documents, authentic information.