Broadcast Archives: Preserving the Future

A survey has been made of the holdings and preservation requirements of ten major European public service broadcast archives. The survey also covered 'the business they do and how they do it': the contribution made by the archives to the business of broadcasting. The archives gave their plans for future services as media moves from 'tapes on shelves' to mass storage and electronic distribution. This paper links the urgent requirements for preservation to a strategy for building the digital archives needed for the future.