The Ethics of Open Access in the Endangered Archives Programme

The Endangered Archives Programme (also known as EAP) gives funding to people running projects to digitise and preserve archival materials at risk of destruction. These can date from any time before the middle of the twentieth century, and from most parts of the world except Europe and North America. The resulting digital images and sound files are made available via the British Library’s website. The Programme has been set up to ensure that the owners of the original archives and the wider community are full participants in these projects, and receive and hold the primary copies of all digital material. Nevertheless, there are ethical issues with the Creative Commons license through which these digital materials are made available, and practical considerations with working globally, and an ongoing conversation about this is a vital part of what we do