The Future of Email Archives: A Report from the Task Force on Technical Approaches for Email Archives

Abstract

After a year of research, the task force's efforts culminated in this concise, yet comprehensive, report, which critically analyzes the entire email life cycle. In its first draft, the report was designed to answer the why, when, who, where, what, and how of email archives based on five different working groups of the task force.4 The veins of this structure are still visible in the final report, as it begins by contextualizing why email archives are important and then walks readers through email's technical properties and how it can be managed. While the report itself addresses these questions, it simultaneously calls for a culture shift to the community at large and advocates for the need to invest resources and expertise in this field.