Ken Perry wrote:

>This is to inquire about the status of the Accession Book in museum
>record keeping. It has been recommended by one of our staff to abandon
>keeping this book in favor of computerized records with a hard copy work
>sheet.  The worksheet information would be entered into the computer.
>I would like to get some feedback as to making a fundmental change such
>as this.


I have been interested to read the responses to Ken's question. I work at
the National Film and Sound Archive in Australia. We acquire not only
films, videos, audio tapes and discs, but also photographs, glass slides,
posters, scripts, manuscripts, costumes, equipment, awards and other
artefacts relating to Australia's audiovisual industry. Our acquisition and
accession records are now completely automated and have been for some
years. The paperwork documenting/leading up to the acquisition (eg
correspondence, deposit contracts, agreements as to special conditions etc)
is filed on a donor's file BUT all the data needed to control and track an
item is in electronic form. (We used to keep a range of hard copy forms in
the past but these are long gone - except of course for things acquired in
the past which have not yet been converted to our database).

I would be interested to know just how serious or founded the concern about
changing of electronic data is. Is there a legal requirement to prove that
the data has not been changed - and if so what data in particular does this
requirement relate to? Or, is it people's experience that data is changed
carelessly (or with negligent intent) thereby causing problems?

We have some concerns at the Archive about how easy it is for staff to
change data as we have very few 'controls' on who can enter what data and
who can change what data. Our general approach to this is to ensure our
staff are well trained so that any database work they/we do is accurate and
trustworthy (in all senses of the word). This isn't foolproof of course and
the odd careless or even suspicious event may occur but we believe that the
small risk we run is outweighed by the increased productivity and high
levels of physical and intellectual control we achieve by processing
materials this way. Data is usually entered straight from whatever
information is available - the object itself, the aquisition paperwork etc
- without the aid of worksheets. Developing these practices with their
concomitant reliance on training, trust and good system design has not been
without pain over the last decade or so but I believe our system - and our
whole organsiation - is the better for it.

Interested in your responses,

Sue


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  Sue Terry                           __  /\
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   +61  6 209 3033 (w)              /        \    Co-Manager, Client Services
   +61  6 286 8336 (h)             /         /    National Film & Sound Archive
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'The secret of survival is to embrace change, and to adapt' (Rohinton Mistry)
_______________________________________________________________________Sue
Terry