4C - Collaboration to Clarify the Costs of Curation

Press Release: New EU collaboration to clarify the costs (and benefits) of curation

The EC has launched a major new project to help organizations invest confidently in digital curation and preservation.

4C - ‘the Collaboration to Clarify the Costs of Curation’ – brings together 13 agencies in 7 different countries so that organizations can approach their investment in data curation and preservation with greater certainty and with greater clarity about what they’ll get back in return.

‘It can be difficult to make a convincing case for investment in digital curation for two reasons’ explained Neil Grindley project co-ordinator from Jisc in the UK.  ‘Firstly the costs of curation are currently hard to predict; and secondly the short term benefits of curation are hard to define because it implicitly addresses long-term challenges. So, even when public policy or regulation requires it, practitioners have the unenviable task of persuading executives to invest in new services whilst being uncertain about their potential impact and their actual cost.  This is particularly hard when they have to compete with immediate priorities that bring instant and obvious returns.’