World Digital Libraries- An International Journal
Year : 2008, Volume : 1, Issue : 1
First page : ( 27) Last page : ( 33)
Print ISSN : 0974-567X. Online ISSN : 0975-7597.

Digitizing cultural heritage and history archives: Case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives)*

Comment Jean-Marc

Swiss Federal Archives

Archivstrasse 24, 3003 Berne, Switzerland Tel: +41313228330; Fax: +41313227828; E-mail: Jean-Marc.Comment@bar.admin.ch

* This article is only the valuation of Jean-Marc Comment on the two projects. It is not the final assessment about the results of the two projects. The final assessment can only be given by the organization responsible for both the projects.

Online published on 25 November, 2013.

Abstract

The author examines the history of two digitalization projects, one in Russia (Comintern Archives) and one in Albania (Albanian Central Archives). He is an IT expert on both the projects. After elaborating on the history of each project, he summarizes the similarities and the differences between the two projects. His comments point out the difficulties that arise from the organization of the project (multilateral versus bilateral), excessively long timescale with the consequence on the technology used, and the failure in estimation of the work to be done and also highlights the fact that there are no clear mandates on how to access this cultural heritage by the public. His study provides positive results like the existence of the pilot stage and the great professionalism of archivists to manage the data input, and the fact that the two projects have succeeded.

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