Hello,

I'm curious to hear if anyone has worked with the digitization company Kofile (www.kofile.com)?  If so, what was your experience with them?  Would you use them again?  The Museum I work for holds the historic county records and the Recorder/Assessors office would like to have all of their plat maps and other documents, as well as the bound Board of Supervisors Minutes that we care for digitized.  These records date from the 1850s through the 1990s.  My understanding is that anything bound will be unbound for scanning.  It's not clear to us yet if the books will be rebound, but when I look at their website it doesn't appear that they will be and that concerns me.  From our meeting yesterday, the county assessor seems more concerned from a professional point of view about getting the documents scanned for "preservation" and access as opposed to an museum/archive's view of preservation.  

Our other concern is that while making these documents more accessible to the public through digitization, the county powers that be may not see us as much of a necessary service.  Staff is part of a non-profit historical society that cares for the county's collection and we are concerned about our funding getting cut in the future because of projects like this.  Another staff member brought up the question that the county might want to downsize and require us to remove the hard copies of anything scanned.  Has anyone else had that happen?     

While I'm not opposed to the digitization of the materials, my concern is for the care and handling of the physical objects and their outcome for our future care of the materials.  I would love to hear thoughts about your experiences with digitization projects or if you've used Kofile.

Thanks,
Julie  

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