Print vs. Electronic Resources
Technology is changing so rapidly that electronic documents from five or more years ago are largely unreadable.
Older electronic documents are deteriorating rapidly.
Those in the know say that the only solution currently to preserve for posterity is to print multiple copies on acid-free paper or standard quality microfilm, distribute the copies to a number of libraries, and to catalog them (on acid-free paper?)!
Notes:
Computer experts tell us that copying documents into new formats is required both for readability and for maintaining the quality of the electronic signals.
How can we just blithely assume that research will inevitably succeed in finding a solution to the problem of preserving electronic formats � and will succeed before this generation of electronic information is permanently lost?