The archiving process begins with a team of dedicated volunteers. These volunteers locate blogs that fit the project criteria and reach out to the blogs’ owners, usually via email. Bloggers who wish to participate and reach out to the EAC independently will be engaging with this same team.
If a blogger responds positively that they want to participate in the project, they receive our Blog Archiving Agreement. This agreement is an editable PDF that grants the EAC permission to archive, and it outlines the rights and responsibilities of both the archive and the blogger. Nothing is archived until the Blog Archiving Agreement is completed and signed by both parties.
So what does archiving a blog entail? When we archive a blog, we are saving an electronic copy of it, which we capture at a specific moment in time. The process is similar to a screenshot taken from your desktop or smartphone.
There is also a possibility to limit or restrict public access to an archived blog by password protection. The scheduled frequency of captures for active blogs is twice a year. Since the quality of writing is essential for this project, we review blogs on an occasional basis to ensure that the content remains relevant and aligned with the objectives and criteria for this project. If a blog no longer fits our criteria — if a blogger repatriates and no longer writes about living abroad, for example — we may decide to stop archiving that blog. If this is the case, we will inform bloggers about this decision.