Twitter and NARA...Can We Get a Final Answer?

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Comment by Terry A. Post on July 10, 2009 at 11:16am

Very interesting discussion! I am in government at the state level, and we share the same concerns. Two thoughts I haven't yet seen in this string: FIRST -- Once things make their way to the Internet, they seem to take on a perpetual life of their own (and most are undated, which makes getting the most current information a tremendous challenge). If these things truly have a life of their own in cyberland, does it make sense for a government entity to have responsibility to archive them also? SECOND -- Since all of Web 2.0 (or 3.0 as some indicate) is in constant Beta testing, meaning that a new technology has replaced the old before the bugs were worked out of the original, would everything thus be considered a "Work in Progress" and as such exempt from open records/open government?

Comment by Scott Horvath on July 8, 2009 at 9:51pm

Thanks for your perspective Robin. I've been talking with another group in our organization that has built a Twitter-archival tool for a new project that they're prototyping. In discussions with them it sounds as if you can record "sent" tweets for up to 200 accounts based upon the API that Twitter offers. If any agency has more than 200 Twitter accounts then I think there's a communications management issue there. Then it's a matter of dumping it down to a "sustainable" format such as XML or CSV. Apparently, they're doing this now in some fashion and with a little tweeking could make it work. So, I will certainly continue looking at that option. Right now the focus is on the main project they're doing, but it's certainly something that is on the plate. If all works out well, and they're OK with the tool, I'll see if they'd be willing to let me share that with everyone. It would certainly be of benefit. Not sure when that will be...but I won't forget.

Comment by Robin Riat on July 8, 2009 at 9:43pm

It is really good to see people talking about records. Like Arian, I'll add my (personal, not in any way NARA policy) 2 cents.

As others have already said far better than I could, the content, purpose, and use - not the format - of the "recorded information" (e-mail, document, blog post, IM, recorded phone call, tweet, wiki, etc.) are what make it a record. That's why it's not easy to declare a format to be a record/nonrecord. Is a photograph a record? Is a paper document a record? It depends on who's creating/receiving/using it, and for what purpose. I really do wish I could give you an easy, one-size-fits-all answer. On the other hand, if NARA did that, I promise you'd hate it because one size never really fits all.

I think the good news here is that making that call doesn't have to be painful. If your agency is starting a new Twitter feed (or a new insert-next-social-media-thing-here), someone is probably considering how it will be used and how it fits into the other work the agency is doing. You just take one additional moment to think about the value of of that to the agency, its customers, and to history. When it comes to deciding the retention period, your agency may already have a records schedule that applies. For example, if my agency has a grants program, and we already have a records retention period for records related to that program, it might apply to our Twitter feed for the program, too. If it doesn't, it's not that hard to make the decision and get the schedule approved.

It would absolutely be easier with the right tools to automate the process. What the records management world has seen over the last several years (and last several new technologies) is that the technology develops much faster than the tools and policies available to manage it. With Twitter, it seems like the right people working with the Twitter API could at least make a dent in the problem.

As Arian said, the records/archives world is thinking about this. The traditional concepts of record, retention, and disposition (preserving something forever in an archives or deleting/destroying it at a specified time) really are evolving. Managing government information intelligently is always going to be a good idea, but exactly how that happens and what that means has to change over time. The trick is to get the social media, IT, records, and archives communities working together.

Comment by Scott Horvath on July 8, 2009 at 7:13am

To make this easier and cheaper for government it would be nice if various Twitter clients like Seesmic Desktop, TweetDeck, and others would provide an option that would automatically keep an XML or CSV type file of all sent tweets from any selected account (if you manage multiple accounts), including direct messages. This way we could simply transfer the log file to NARA for official government Twitter accounts based upon our disposition schedules.

This would also remove the issue of having to worry about whether we place an undue burden on organizations to capture tweets as records, or not, since the tools would perform this function automatically.

A next step would be to have a .gov entity, or have NARA or GSA, partner with a third-party that could provide a web-based tool for allowing the same capability of automatically capturing sent tweets and DMs from authenticated government Twitter accounts.

GSA? NARA? Anyone? Who at your agencies can make this happen?

Comment by Arian D. Ravanbakhsh on July 7, 2009 at 6:40pm

OK - again, these answers are worth the price you paid...

If the agency determines that a Tweet or a posting to Facebook is a record, then it must make the effort to capture that record for as long as it is needed for agency (and perhaps NARA's if it appraised as a permanent record) purposes. Which means they would have to get a records retention schedule (SF 115) approved by NARA for the disposition of that material. NARA would be agnostic on how that is accomplished. For my personal use, I've been using Tweetake to capture and retain all of my Tweets in .csv format. It's a nice solution for me, don't know how well it would scale up.

To Ari's example of making a comment, I think Scott is correct. If it's clearly personal, not a record. On the other hand, if in an official capacity it may certainly rise to the level of the record and have to be preserved.

To me, this discussion simply underscores what I've been saying to my professional colleagues (some at NARA, most within the larger archival/RM community) - that the traditional concepts of the 20th century records management world are evolving. We're thinking about all of this - we just haven't articulated the answers yet.

Comment by Scott Horvath on July 7, 2009 at 5:58pm

If a gov't employee posts a comment on GovLoop does it have to be archived? No, I don't believe so. However if that person is responding in an official business capacity then maybe.

Comment by Ari Herzog, MPA on July 7, 2009 at 5:29pm

To further Scott's question, here's another for Arian:

If a government employee posts a comment on youtube.com after watching a video, is that comment required to be archived? If so, how to prove the comment was made if the commenter doesn't report it?

Comment by Scott Horvath on July 7, 2009 at 2:42pm

Arian,

Thanks for that great information. I read through the IM information and I do see where Twitter is easily equated to instant messaging. However, my concern is that it still seems to be more pointed toward applications, or services, running ON agency networks:

"Agencies that allow IM traffic on their networks must recognize that such content may be a Federal record under that definition and must manage the records accordingly."

That leads to the question, "If I'm using Twitter at work to post official tweets, is that considered allowing "IM traffic on" my agency network? Maybe I'm getting into the weeds here, but I think there needs to be some clarification there. Now if using Twitter IS considered "IM" then A) that document needs to be updated at some point and B) we will need to have some examples by other agencies on how they "log" IM traffic.

But if the tweet is not considered "IM" but instead a standard "web record" then the question is, "Do interactions on third-party sites not government owned constitute a web record?" I know that language says "machine readable materials" and "made or received by an agency of the United States Government" but if it includes third party sites then the language needs to specifically state that. Right now it seems like such a gray area.

In the end, if I'm not mistaken, it says that we need to work with our Agency reps to determine if "tweets" or Facebook posts, etc are considered valid records to be captured. If the Agency says "no" then they need to ask a NARA official who gets the final word? If "yes" then there are bigger issues to be concerned with regarding privacy, personally identifiable information, resources and methods for capturing content, etc, correct?

Comment by Arian D. Ravanbakhsh on July 7, 2009 at 2:06pm

Andy - Thanks for the heads up and pointer to this discussion. I'll add a couple of thoughts with the big caveat that these are my opinions and should not be read in any way as constituting official NARA policy.

First, the CFR is clear that each individual agency is responsible for identifying their records. NARA's role is to provide agencies with an understanding of what to do regarding records management (and why they have to do it) as opposed to how those individual RM requirements get carried out. Once information is determined to be a record, it may not be disposed of without the consent of the Archivist of the US (via a SF-115 and the standard NARA appraisal practice).

The notion that social media/web 2.0 change things is accurate to a point. I think the guidance spelled out in the Managing Web Records guidance is still on point. I'll also mention several other pieces of NARA guidance that have been developed that would be relevant to this discussion.

1) If you equate Twitter postings with IM - not a far stretch - then our IM FAQ might be relevant:
http://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/initiatives/im-faq.html

2) We've also developed guidance on Selecting Sustainable Formats that advises agencies on how to choose electronic formats for records:
http://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/initiatives/sustainable-faq.html

These and other resources and best practices in records management are available in our Toolkit for Managing Electronic Records at: http://toolkit.archives.gov

One final thought - I know that NARA is certainly aware of these issues and is working to provide agencies with the right guidance and tools to meet their business needs.

Arian

Comment by Scott Horvath on July 7, 2009 at 11:27am

I believe phone records ARE logged and archived as well...if I'm not mistaken.

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