About SPN

Mission

The Software Preservation Network (SPN) is a coordinated, distributed effort to ensure long term access to software through community engagement, infrastructure support, and knowledge generation.

Guided by the belief that software is critical information infrastructure, SPN works to create a space in which organizations and individuals from cultural heritage, industry, academia, government, and the public sphere can contribute their myriad skills and capabilities toward collaborative solutions that will provide persistent access to software and software-dependent data.
We believe that software should be curated and preserved because it is both: a dependency to access existing digital data and because it has intrinsic cultural value due to its mediating role in our lives. Software is critical information infrastructure.

SPN is committed to fostering an open, inclusive, and safe environment. Please see our Code of Conduct for more information.

How We Work

Working Groups

SPN Working Groups are organized around the network’s core activity areas. Working Groups have clearly articulated scopes and action plans that map to SPN Mission, Vision, Values, and Strategic Goals. Learn more about SPN’s Working Groups here!

Coordinating Committee

The Coordinating Committee of the Software Preservation Network (SPN) was established in March 2019 to serve as the core body of governance of the organization. Its primary function is to maintain connections between the members, and the concerns and resources, of what is a globally distributed and collaborative organization. Among its coordination activities are annual reviews and approval of organizational goals and strategies, providing high-level guidance to SPN staff on day-to-day operations for the coming year, reviewing and approving budgets developed and proposed by staff, and reviewing steps to ensure continuity of SPN activity.

EAASI Research Alliance

The international EAASI Research Alliance, convened by the Software Preservation Network, is a multinational community of libraries, archives, and museums that utilize the EAASI software to broaden access to digital collections of culture and scholarship.

Together, these organizations explore how the EAASI software can be used to provide and preserve access to software-dependent collections for educational and research purposes. SPN is the exclusive entry point to the Alliance, and qualified libraries, archives, or museums who are members of SPN have the option to participate in the Alliance as part of their SPN member benefits.

Learn more about the EAASI Research Alliance here!

Our Impact

Anti-Circumvention Exemption for Software Preservation

Since 2017, the Cyberlaw Clinic (with sincere appreciation to Chris Bavitz, Managing Director of the Cyberlaw Clinic and Kendra Albert, Clinical Director at the Cyberlaw Clinic), has successfully represented SPN in the proceedings for exemptions to the anti-circumvention provisions in US copyright law. SPN has also worked closely with Mx. Albert and students at the Cyberlaw Clinic on two editions of A Preservationist’s Guide to the DMCA Exemption for Software Preservation, 2nd Edition.

Fair Use Best Practices for Software Preservation & Fair Dealing

Since 2017, SPN has published a number of reports on community best practices surrounding software preservation as a way to outline clear guidelines for the application of fair use to the preservation of software and software dependent materials including:

Understanding the state-of-the-field:

In 2022, the Software Preservation Network’s Research-in-Practice Working Group published their findings from a multi-year survey-and interview-based study of software preservation service providers, including archivists, librarians, preservation specialists, technologists, and other information professionals in Supporting Software Preservation Services in Research and Memory Organizations

In 2023, the Video Game History Foundation and the Software Preservation Network co-published Survey of the Video Game Reissue Market in the United States. Written by SPN member Phil Salvador, results of the survey revealed that only thirteen percent of historical video games published in the United States are currently in release–raising questions about whether the commercial market alone can adequately preserve the medium of video games, particularly for the needs of researchers.

Building capacity and broadening participation:

The SPN Metadata Working Group has grounded its work on the Software Metadata Recommended Format Guide (SMRF) in the understanding that most stewardship organizations have not actively collected software, and by extension, their current digital asset/data management/repository systems and curation workflows do not yet include metadata specific to software.