Corporation for Public Broadcasting Fiscal Year 2009

The American Archive is a system for both preservation and continuing distribution of content that shares the public service orientation and sensibility of the public broadcasting system. It could ultimately involve scores of thousands of hours of content—both programs and back-up material—reaching back as many as seven decades. It advances the mission of public broadcasting by unlocking the artistic, scientific, social, and political heritage embedded within the ephemeral programming created by and for public broadcasting, particularly at the local level. It also facilitates the effective use of digital media, extending the life and usefulness of the content to diverse audiences. Overall, this pilot program creates a diverse subset of historically relevant, digitized public television and radio content, helping to identify the kinds of challenges that may arise in digitizing content as part of full implementation of the archive.