The regional centers supported by NEH provide information by telephone, fax, and e-mail to anyone who has an inquiry, be they an institution or an individual. Among the types of institutions that are served are performing arts organizations, religious and civic groups, hospitals, learned societies, social welfare agencies, sports clubs, historic preservation societies, and research libraries. Building a Digital Future of Quality All of our organizations that view preservation as key to our missions are concerned about identifying the most effective methods to preserve the greatest numbers of research materials. Until now, microfilming has been the method of choice when materials are already brittle. With newer, less embrittled printed works, mass deacidification has also proven effective.
Digitization is still no substitute for microfilming and mass de-acidification of brittle materials.
For that reason, we strongly support the collaboration of NEH with the National Science Foundation to encourage further research into the techniques of assuring long-term access to digital information. Digitization is, however, a very important method for making the intellectual and cultural record of the United States readily accessible to educators, students, and scholars. We strongly support NEH's efforts to complement its mission to preserve these resources by the commitment to make special collections and published materials as accessible as possible. Digital technology gives us a new opportunity to extend the reach of the humanities into every classroom, every home, and every library. An ever-increasing body of knowledge is now available only in electronic form, and because so many more individuals can view materials on the screens of their personal computers, many repositories of specialized and rare materials are digitizing their precious holdings so others have access to them.