Defining "Born Digital" by OCLC research (Ricky Erway)

Well the definition provided by the author does hold water as stated, "born-digital resources are items created and managed in digital form."

The author's selection of types included,

• photos
• documents
• web content
• manuscripts
• electronic records
• static data sets
• dynamic data
• art
• media publications

Each type was provided with a suggested medium and as an experienced hoarder I  was intrigued that in some aspect digital document organization at home is going really well, but like all consumers/creators not maintaining a consistent file-naming convention.  So, basically I create "folksonomies" metadata for my use only. I can imagine caretakers of large "born Digital" collections deal with create one-trick pony solutions on a case by case situations.

Many difficulties face information professionals in creating, maintaining and accessing digital content as well as, avoiding outdated medium, poor use of funds allocated to resources development, and integrity of formats.

Suggestion for the way forward are common sense to most of who understand the variety of issues facing metadata in a total digital world.  The establishment of standards, tool and procedures is the tedious work  but is the opportunity to show the value of information organization and create value for end-users of born-digital collections.