The UK Web Archiving Consortium (UKWAC) is the result of
collaboration between The British Library, Joint Information
Systems Committee of the Higher and Further Education Councils
(JISC), The National Archives, The National Library of Wales, the
National Library of Scotland and the Wellcome Trust.
According to David Thomas, Head of Government Archives Services
at the National Archives, "From government organisations posting
travel advice to newlyweds putting their wedding photos on-line,
web sites provide a unique insight into the political and social
world we live in today."
But with web pages currently having a life expectancy of 44 days
– on a par with a housefly, according to UKWAC – the group is
concerned that invaluable scholarly, cultural and scientific
resources are being lost to future generations.
The group is therefore experimenting with a web archiving
system, using software that has been used in a similar scheme in
Australia. UKWAC is due to run for an initial period of two years
and if successful could be extended from the initial target of
6,000 web sites, to a full archive of all UK web sites.
Each consortium member will be responsible for material relevant
to its subject or domain. For example, says UKWAC, the Scottish and
Welsh national libraries will collect material reflecting the
culture and history of Scotland and Wales, while the Wellcome Trust
will take an interest in medical web sites.
Informal documents, such as blogs or discussion forums, will
also be included in the archive – so as to provide a comprehensive
picture of the UK on-line.
But UK copyright law requires that UKWAC obtains the permission
of web site owners before their material can be archived – a factor
that will undoubtedly make it difficult for the group to reach
their goal of archiving all of the millions of UK web sites in
existence.
According to reports, the group is actively looking for a change
in the law to allow the archiving of web sites without the need to
obtain consent.
The project is similar to the San Francisco-based Internet
Archive, a non-profit organisation which has been building an
internet library since 1996. Its purpose is to offer permanent
access for researchers, historians, and scholars to historical
collections that exist in digital format. Using its Wayback
Machine, anyone can examine billions of archived pages that date
back to 1999.
