Collaborating to Clarify the Cost of Curation

In spite of significant efforts to align policies and technologies to enable digital preservation, one commentator has recently noted that a shortage of money is the greatest threat to the long term future of our digital heritage. This article describes the work of an EC-funded project, the Collaboration to Clarify the Costs of Curation (4C), with particular reference to a gap analysis and stakeholder needs survey which have been completed and early drafts of an Economic Sustainability Reference Model which is now available for comment. All of this will help the project to offer a “Curation Costs Exchange” service.