The last option is recommended. Interlibrary Loan is Expensive RLG's Interlibrary Loan Advisory Committee, established in 1988, did an ILL cost study that was completed in 1992. New and unexpected findings come to light every year. They are writing a report and hope to publish it in 1994. At the National Archives in Washington, the shrink-wrap study has been completed.
Paper is still the best way of delivering high thought content.
Upward Migration Paths to New Media are Advocated Trudy Peterson, as the Acting Archivist of the United States, summarizes in Archival Outlook for November the Archives' recent reassessment of digital storage media in three areas. As these formats become obsolete, the Archives' Center for Electronic Records believes it can handle the conversion problem. Second, file transfers over networks will simplify things, eliminating any incompatibility between the media used by the agency that created them and the media used for storage at the Archives, as long as open transfer standards are observed. Third the Archives will soon make available guidelines for use of digital imaging and optical media storage technologies in the federal government. Peterson believes these standards offer the most effective long-term solution to technology obsolescence.