LOCKSS Launches Community Initiative to Preserve Scholarly  Content [Forwarding from Blackwell.  --Peter.] NEWS RELEASE Media Contact: Ginny Foley Public Relations Manager Blackwell Publishing, Inc. Tel: +1 781 388  8334  vfoley@bos.blackwellpublishing.com LOCKSS Launches Community Initiative to Preserve Scholarly Content Boston Mass, January 23, 2006 Â A group of  publishers, librarians, and learned societies  have launched an initiative employing the LOCKSS  (Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe) technology to  support a Âlarge dark archiveÂ that serves as a  failsafe  repository  for published scholarly content. The initiative, Controlled LOCKSS (CLOCKSS), aims  to provide assurance to the research community  that a disaster, which would prevent the delivery  of content, will not obstruct access to journal content. CLOCKSS content or the Âorphaned contentÂ would  only become available after a ÂtriggerÂ event,  such as the material was no longer available from  the publisher. In these situations, a joint  advisory board, representing societies,  publishers and libraries, will begin the process  to determine if the content is orphaned and  whether it should be made publicly available. The  board ensures that content is controlled but that  no one person or sector has authority over  orphaned digital materials in the system. ÂOur community needs to ensure that when content  becomes orphaned there is a process through which  it becomes publicly accessible,Â said Vicky  Reich, Director LOCKSS Program, Stanford  University Libraries. ÂThe CLOCKSS project offers  an alternative solution to archiving and its  strength lies in the fact that it has been  founded by publishers and librarians and will remain collectively managed.Â CLOCKSS provides additional functionality to the  LOCKSS system, which is widely known in the  scholarly communications world as a technology  for ensuring the integrity of digital content,  and is used as part of preservation strategies  for electronic journals to which libraries  subscribe. CLOCKSS also differs from LOCKSS in  that participating libraries will archive both  subscribed and non-subscribed journals, with the  ultimate goal of archiving all of the journals of participating publishers ÂAs more scholars rely upon access to electronic  journals, it has become critical to explore ways  to ensure long-term availability of journal  content,Â says Karen Wittenborg, University  Librarian, University of Virginia. ÂThis  collaborative initiative addresses the  uncertainty that librarians have confronted in  the digital environment and shows promise of  offering a real solution for long-term preservation.Â The initial two-year pilot will include at least  five research libraries, and several commercial  and society publishers. During this time,  publishers and libraries will continue to work  closely to collect and analyze data and develop a  proposal for a full-scale archiving model. As  part of a longer-term strategy to permanently  preserve published work, CLOCKSS will report the  findings to the wider community and begin the  dialogue about a global infrastructure to ensure  preservation of all past, present, and future scholarly content. Participating Members * Publishers Â American Medical Association,  American Physiological Society, Blackwell  Publishing, Nature Publishing Group, Oxford  University Press, SAGE Publications, Springer,  Taylor and Francis, John Wiley & Sons, Inc. In  addition, Elsevier is participating in all  discussions and is sharing in financial support. * Libraries - University of Edinburgh, Indiana  University, New York Public Library, Rice  University, Stanford University, University of Virginia For more information, visit  http://www.lockss.org/clockss .