Back from MARAC in Chautauqua and I've already got the tracks of the 8-Ball having rolled over me back and forth a few times this week. :)

We have a new Director who is interested in beefing up our technology. Could be a good thing, probably more non-archival work on my plate. Too many responsibilities to fit into a 32-hour week. Of course, email stopped working and the server seized up yesterday, so I haven't had a chance to prepare for my first real meeting with the new boss (about everything).

Just a note from one of the MARAC sessions, because I don't want to forget it later. In a preservation discussion section (which was cleverly titled -- I thought that it was going to be about time management for Lone Arrangers), it occurs to me that the best place to store Disaster Recovery / Continuation of Operations (DRCOOP) would be on an online document store ... for example, Google Documents. There are two big problems with actual DRCOOP situations -- keeping the documents updated and disseminated (meaning -- getting the people who need to know where the docs are and how to get to them and actually read them before a disaster happens), and having access to the documents in an actual disaster. One disaster planning workshop I've attended recommends having "the briefcase" for each facility site. That briefcase contains all the plans, contact information, flashlight, etc. and you're supposed to keep it near an exterior door of your facility ... or at home, or both. A good idea in theory, but if you have a catastrophic disaster at 3 AM, you've lost the facility briefcase. If the fellow who has the home copy can be contacted and the briefcase is up-to-date, that is great... but why not just put all the documents somewhere where multiple people who will be called upon to respond can access and update them? Yes, you still should keep a hard-copy at home, and update it often. However, by using an online document store, it should always be possible to get to the documents (If you can't get to them at home, go to the library. If the libraries are all closed, go to a 24-hour Kinko's [perhaps I'm a bit big-city-centric here]). If the entire city gets cratered, or is quarantined (more likely to be a recoverable scenario), someone in the organization can carry on without having to don a Haz-Mat suit.

Tags: disaster_recovery