Don Andes wrote:
P.S. I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel here so if someone knows of a accepted method that libraries/archives are currently using please let me know.
In addition to Don's list of criteria I would add that if we're talking about a collecting research library or archive, a very important filtering device for what to collect/save is what most fits your mission statement, i.e. what areas your institution collects in and regards as most important to its mission. This kind of falls under Don's "personal taste" category, but it's more strongly-defined. So if your area of collection is American country music of the mid twentieth century, as opposed to Balkan music or American oral histories of the 1970s, you would err on the side of preserving those items in your collection that most fit that bill. This is why mission statements are so important: they make the archivist's job that much easier and let him or her off the hook in many cases.
Matt Snyder Music Archivist Wilson Processing Project The New York Public Library
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