Born-digital materials are another factor shaping the work, and future of collections at the National Library of Wales. Many of us now create digital content: writing e-mails, taking pictures, contributing to social websites, and through our daily work perhaps. These items, typed on the screen of a computer (or increasingly on mobile phones or other devices) or the pictures stored by a camera are born-digital. The digital is their original form. We might copy, edit, tag or change them; save or delete them, or print them out. We might also keep copies in many different places.
The Welsh Literature Archive Project has been working with writers to see how they go about producing their work – using computers, as well as pen and paper. The National Library of Wales is the home of Welsh literary archives, and while these currently are almost all paper-based, very soon they will be a mix of paper and born-digital materials. I’ll be in conversation about the project with a Welsh author at The National Eisteddfod in August; please come along for a chat, or feel free to get in touch – electronically or on paper.