Policy Statement
This document describes the policies governing the acquisition, curation, and management of materials in York University Libraries’ Digital Preservation Program. These include digital objects created by YUL, university records based on the Common Records Schedule, private archives acquired for research and teaching, and published digital objects that require local hosting and rights management. York University Libraries makes available collections that support research and scholarship according to the needs of the York University Libraries Digital Preservation Program's Designated Community.
Selection Criteria
For inclusion within a YUL preservation platform, objects must meet all Level One criteria and a consideration of Level Two criteria.
Level One
Criteria covers objective standards such as copyright, extent, and format.
Each item must:
- Be intended for permanent storage;
- Be intended for non-commercial public viewing, or educational/research and use;
- Be in the public domain, or have documented, non-revocable permission granted by the copyright holder, unless access is governed by legislation or agreements with donors;
- Be in a standard format accessible through current file viewers, or have a documented conversion path to move the format into a standard format;
- Have at least minimum required descriptive metadata as outlined in the metadata application profile;
- Apart from self-archiving of published works, items must be unique or novel, a similar or identical digital object should not already exist;
- Be as complete as possible.
Level Two
Criteria cover subjective elements requiring review, assessment, and the professional judgement of the librarians, archivists, and staff in collaboration with subject experts and community partners. Requests should fit within the mandate of YUL's collection development policy. Materials should also have broad and enduring value. Research and/or administrative value is defined both locally and globally, with cultural heritage as the priority.
Retention and Evaluation
All objects included in York University Libraries Digital Preservation Program are intended to be retained permanently upon acceptance. Individuals and projects responsible for transferring collections and/or objects to York University Libraries which require significant digital storage space will be responsible for the costs of long-term storage and backup. The York University Libraries’ Digital Preservation Program will not be used as a temporary storage facility.
Reviewed: March 7, 2022