Columbia University Libraries joins the international digital preservation community today in celebrating World Digital Preservation Day to recognize the collections preserved, the access maintained and the understanding fostered by preserving digital materials. The commemorative day seeks “to create greater awareness of digital preservation that will translate into a wider understanding which permeates all aspects of society – business, policy making, personal good practice.”

Columbia Libraries holds many millions of digital items in over 300 computer file formats, content that includes digitized reproductions of papyri and clay tablets, manuscripts, archival photographs, historical publications, artworks, sound recordings, film, video, and three-dimensional objects, as well as archival material from statesmen, politicians, and philanthropic organizations such as the Ford and Carnegie foundations. Our digital collections are expanding rapidly as a result of new acquisitions of content originating in digital format, and our ongoing digitization of unique cultural heritage materials from new and existing archival and specialized collections continues. On our website, you can view a portion of our preserved digital collections that we have published for open use, such as the Columbia Spectator Archive, the papers of composer Ulysses Kay, and the holdings of sixteenth-century Italian architect and theoretician, Sebastiano Serlio.