Since joining the Flickr Commons, several users have wowed us with their insightful comments and tags on our photos.  After highlighting the work of TVL1970 a few months ago, we’ve interviewed another avid Flickr contributor.  Penny Richards of Redondo Beach, CA, better known to Flickr users as Pennylrichardsca, has contributed tags, comments, and even shared [...]

I invite you to join me on Tuesday, April 12, 2011 for the Media Access to Government Information Conference (MAGIC) at the National Archives downtown.  The goal of the conference is to discuss how technology might improve access to government information for journalists and citizens alike.  The conference is free, open to the public, and [...]

Being a journalist in this digital and new media age presents challenges and frustrations of tracking down and accessing Federal, State, and Local government information needed to produce responsible and accurate news products. Read today’s blog for an invitation to a free conference co-sponsored by NARA and Duke University on April 12, focusing on ways that journalists and researchers may better discover, access, and use digital government information.

The following is a guest post from Susan Cummings, Director of Access Programs. At the last couple of Researcher Users Group meetings we discussed the need for NARA to periodically move records out of Archives I and II to make room for new accessions to be processed by the DC area staff.  Subsequently, we posted for [...]

My bottom line: I want to believe the next generation of public servants will do right by the American people by managing and preserving the government’s born-digital records, and providing the means for continuing access to them, so as to ensure that the history of the 21st century is properly preserved.

Today’s Family Tree Friday is brought to you by Constance Potter, Archivist in the Archives I Research Support Branch. The 1940 census opens on April 2, 2012. For the first time, the census will be released digitally, not on microfilm. As with other censuses, this one reflects the previous decade of the 1930s and the [...]

Ever wonder what exciting new projects the many employees at NARA are working on? The “What are You Working On?” blog feature aims to introduce a variety of NARA employees and highlight some of the exciting projects we are working on around the agency. Check for this blog series on Wednesdays! This week, we introduce [...]

Conventional wisdom is that the appraisal process for electronic records is the same as for paper. Richard Pearce-Moses made that statement in his 2006 Presidential Address to the joint meeting of Archivists in DC. Randall Jimerson quoted him in Archives Power. However, conventional wisdom isn’t always all we need to know. Buried under Richard’s statement [...]

NARA has a long history of involvement with the development of international standard related to electronic records and other digital information.

Claims of trustworthiness are easy to make but are thus far difficult to justify or objectively prove. Establishing more clear criteria detailing what a trustworthy repository is and is not has become vital.

Have you ever looked at a Civil War pension file and wondered, what does this all REALLY mean? More specifically, have you ever tried to figure out what each document or slip of paper actually was, where it came from, and what relevance it had to the file as a whole?  Believe it or not, [...]