Archive Writing: The Gold Standard for Document Preservatio

1. Archive Writing: The Gold Standard for Document Preservation

2. Archive Writing: The Gold Standard for Document Preservation

3. Archive Writing • Archive Writing puts your digital images onto microfilm. • In more technical terms, it produces a technology-independent analogue back-up of your digital records. • But why would you want an analogue copy when the world has gone digital? • Archive writing to microfilm preserves your documents and avoids technology obsolescence. • You can also eliminate storage costs for paper documents. Plus, it takes about 95% less space to store microfilm than it does paper. 

4. Archive Writing • Archive writing provides an excellent solution for disaster recovery. • Unlike paper or digital records, microfilm can survive a flood or hurricane, and retain your information for longer than any other format available –hundreds of years. • Archive writing also creates an admissible document format for legal proceedings. • With enhanced security of your information, your organization is also better positioned to comply with new government regulations.

5. Archive Writing • Preservation is Key! • Living in a digital world means information can flow around the globe in seconds. • Speed and ease have caused us the massive migration to digital information. And because we’re always looking for faster and better, technology upgrades guarantee records will become inaccessible in very short order. • All of the advancements that we’ve enjoyed in digital hardware and software over the years have come at the expense of preservation. • Critical information that must be accessed over the course of time can’t rely on digital formats. Instead, it must use archive writing to ensure ongoing availability well into the future.

6. Archive Writing • Any valuable, historical document must be preserved through archive writing. • If you record these critical documents solely on digital formats, you will eventually become obsolete. You will lose them within a short period of time. • Just think about the short life span of digital media. • In the last 20 years, digital data has been preserved on a variety of media: floppy disks in 8”, 5.25 and 3.5” formats; tape cassettes; zip drives; CDs, DVDs, Flash drives and more. • For this reason and many others, archive writing makes better sense for preserving documents well into the future. • Transferring documents to microfilm avoids the issues with obsolete mediums and proprietary technologies that would render access difficult and costly, if not impossible.

7. Archive Writing • Digital conversions also require constant maintenance. • As technologies evolve, you’ll need to regularly migrate to the latest hardware and software versions to ensure access of your critical documents, and there is also no way to predict how often or costly these migrations will be. • Archive writing allows your organization to have the best of both worlds. • You get all the benefits of the digital age with the security of an analogue format. • If a digital file is accidentally deleted or subjected to a virus, you have the peace of mind knowing you can retrieve your microfilm image. • With digital and analogue formats, your critical files remain safe, complete and easily accessible.

8. About the Author Kevin D'Arcy is VP of Sales and Marketing for MES Hybrid Document Systems, Ontario's leading document scanning and document management supplier. For more information about Archive Writing, visit http://www.mesltd.ca.