Glossary of Terms – Philadelphia Audiovisual Collections Evaluation Survey

audiovisual collections:
these collections focus on film, video, and audio, but they can also include photographs, prints, and textual records that complement the film, video, and audio materials.

born-digital: 
any material originally created in a digital format (e.g. video from digital cameras). Born-digital items are distinct from analog items that are subsequently digitized, such as VHS tapes or print photographs.

community media collections: 
the documentation and gathering, outside a traditional archive, of media material produced in service of the community who creates it.

data integrity: 
the maintenance of data accuracy, completeness, and quality over time through a variety of approaches and tools, including information security, checksums, fixity checks, replication, and backups.

designated communities:
the communities that collections are geared for and may also represent.

digital preservation: 
the managed activities, strategies, best practices and standards, and policies and procedures needed to ensure continued access to digital materials 

digitized media:
digital reproductions of non-digital originals, such as digitized copies of a film

file naming conventions:
a framework for naming your files in a way that describes what they contain and how they relate to other files. This can include elements such as the file creator’s name, the project name, the date of creation, and the version number.

forensic technologies: 
a set of tools and methods for copying and analyzing all of the digital information from a physical medium in such a way that ensures the integrity and authenticity of the information are preserved.

format obsolescence:
the risk of file content becoming unreadable or inaccessible as a result of file formats or programs becoming obsolete.  

metadata: 
structured information that helps to describe, manage, preserve, retrieve, and deliver a digital object. There are four types of metadata:

1. descriptive metadata: it enables the discovery, identification, and selection of resources. It can include elements such as author, date, and subject.
2. administrative metadata: it facilitates the management of resources and ensures that they can be used in the future. It can include elements such as access restrictions, provenance, and rights.
3. structural metadata: it documents the relationships between different components of a digital object or between different digital objects. It can include elements such as a table of contents or the order in which digital items (such as video and audio tracks) are played in a container file, like an MP4.
4. technical metadata: it provides information on the characteristics and composition of a digital file, including elements like file format, file size, compression information, and camera make and model. 

mission statement: 
a formal summary that outlines why the organization exists and the goals that guide its work 

preservation:
the activities that prolong the usable life of archival records. Preservation activities (e.g. providing a stable environment for records of all media type, using safe handling and storage methods, copying potentially fragile materials into a usable format (e.g. microfilming or digitization) are designed to minimize the deterioration of records and to prevent the loss of informational content.