1. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 1 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Comintern Archives: 240’000 files; 10-12 millions documents in 90 languages Albanian National Archives: 660’000 files and reference about 840’000 documents; one language

2. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 2 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Comintern Archives: International Committee with 8 partner organizations and a budget of 1’600’000 USD Albanian National Archives: bilateral cooperation Albania – Switzerland and a budget of 200’000 USD

3. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 3 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Comintern Archives: data input of the files in a database in Russian and digitization of 1’000’000 pages of documents; translation of the descriptors in English Albanian National Archives: data input of the files and the reference to the documents in a database in Albanian

4. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 4 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Comintern Archives: database and images are available in the reading room in Moscow and by the 8 partner organizations; Internet solution is in preparation Albanian National Archives: database is available in the reading room through an Intranet solution; Internet deployement will start soon

5. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 5 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Comintern Archives: project of 10 years (1993-2003); costs 40% hardware-software, 46% digitization work, 14% project management Albanian National Archives: project of 3 years (2001-2003); costs 66% hardware-software, 33% digitization work, 1% project management

6. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 6 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Comintern Archives: client-server technology developped in C++ under Windows XP and an Oracle database, images in JPEG Albanian National Archives: client-server technology developped in C++ under Windows 2000 and an Oracle database

7. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 7 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Similarities 1 Archival: findings aids are digitalized with archival standard of description ISAD (G) Technical: same sort of software solution but from foreign companies so difficulty to find IT specialists in the home country

8. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 8 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Similarities 2 Managerial: difficulty to built a good and professional organization and to have clear figures at the beginning of the project about what to digitize and how Social: to create jobs in and out of the Archives; help to selfhelp

9. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 9 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Differences 1 Political: how to take the decision and to find the financing Archival: in the Comintern project we have a second component with the digitization of 1’000’000 pages of documents and the translation of the descriptors in English

10. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 10 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Differences 2 Technical: the Comintern project has a two long timescale; the technical changes are more rapid Managerial: the Comintern project have needed to much money for its organization

11. ICDL 2004; Jean-Marc Comment, Swiss Federal Archives 11 Archiving cultural heritage and history through digitization: case studies from Russia (Comintern Archives) and Albania (National Archives) Conclusions Organization must be as light as possible Timescale must be short: maximal 3 years Make a pilot stage to allow a good estimation of the work to be done Plan all the lifecycle of the project: from preservation to access