Photo Preservation and Sharing - Any Step is a Good Step

Families and volunteer dependent community historical societies can easily become overwhelmed with the range of photo and document image preservation and sharing possibilities. Technology and the Internet have fostered many competitive services all willing to help you store, preserve, and showcase photo and document collections.

At the same time, professional curators and archivists are scrambling to keep up with the growing volume of materials to preserve, and the setting of standards that will make it possible to globally share all of this information.

Professionals who are being paid to find ways to connect their collection to a global network of libraries and museums must be mindful of the avalanche of information. Non-professionals are often simply blinded by this volume of information about what can and should be done.

Non-professionals simply do not have the time, money, tools, or training to undertake preservation projects in the same way as paid professionals in a library or museum preservation department.

Therefore, families and community historical society volunteers should become comfortable that any step toward preserving and sharing photos or documents in their collections is a good step.

Volunteers and families can accomplish much by starting small and taking modest steps by using inexpensive and readily available services to preserve and share their most treasured images. A worthy objective may be to digitize and index an entire collection. However, simply finding 25 or so treasured family or community images and sharing them with a broader audience on a free share site will provide meaningful enjoyment to all involved.