 An American poet once observed that all history is modern history. For at any given time, that which is past may inform our present knowledge and our future actions. Imagine losing the documents most important to you. Your home deed and title. Letters your father wrote while at war. Photos of past generations of your family and videos of your newborn baby. Now imagine losing knowledge about an entire society and the impact that would make on a nation. It would be a tragedy of epic proportions. Since 1934, the National Archives and Records Administration, or NARA, has been a public trust on which our democracy depends. NARA enables people to personally inspect the record of what the American government has done by preserving valuable records of business conducted by the United States federal government. This evidence documents the rights of American citizens, the actions of federal officials, and the national experience. This enormous responsibility is shouldered by the women and men of the National Archives. We're preserving the story of our nation day by day in all its complexity. There's a rich variety of information in the records that we receive, but also a complexity in the formats in which they've been documented. Our mission and our challenge is to find the best way to preserve each record for posterity. Through the years, National Archivists have battled mold, mildew, fire and water damage to preserve materials related to our nation's history. The machines used to create records in the late 20th century have long been replaced by technologies that are faster, better and cheaper. And the technology that is new today is expected to be obsolete within 18 months. When you're preserving paper, you really want to hold on to what you've got. In the digital environment, if you hold on to what you've got, you've probably lost it. One fundamental problem is most digital media just don't last very long. They self-destruct over time or are destroyed by environmental contaminants and other factors. When the medium starts wearing out, you copy the stuff to a newer medium. The more difficult problem is 20, 25 years from now, computers will not recognize the formats that we're storing stuff in today. That's a moving target because the software industry is constantly changing the formats as they improve their products. The issue of thousands of incompatible data formats is only part of the challenge. Within 20 years, we need to be able to manage easily 10 trillion objects, a thousand times greater than we estimated a few years back. NARA's first step in solving this complex problem was to establish a network of partnerships with world-class computer scientists, engineers and information management professionals. In addition, it conducted research with a number of archivists, private and public sector industry experts and professionals at many federal agencies. NARA asked, 50 years from now, how will individuals be able to access the digital records we create today? Research and expert counsel pointed the way to the answer. The archives of the future would require the development of an extraordinarily innovative tool. The AERA system, a fully operational and fully deployed electronic records archives. Using the AERA system, NARA will be able to preserve and provide access to any type of electronic record created anywhere in the federal government. The AERA system will enable NARA to improve its services to federal agencies in the public and make it easier for these agencies, congress and the courts to transfer electronic records to the national archives. The goal for AERA when it comes to accessioning the electronic records of the federal government and our relationship with other federal agencies is a key component of the success of AERA. It will also be designed to handle any future changes in file reading software and storage hardware, all in a secure technological environment. This is a collaborative laboratory that we have set up that basically enables the national archives, government officials and visitors to interact with world-class researchers that we work with through our external partners. We're actually able to bring in scientists and engineers and their technologies to begin the process of testing and evaluating their use for NARA's ERA program. The AERA system will enable NARA to accept any type of electronic record created anywhere in the federal government and authentically preserve it and make it available for research. The AERA system will enable people to discover, use and trust the information held at the national archives. This is an exciting time for the National Archives and for its partners. Together we're creating a capability that doesn't exist today, a capability that will ensure for our great-great-grandchildren they'll have access to the records of our time. While ERA presents significant challenges, we have extraordinary staff, both archivists, technologists, contractors and partners to help us meet the challenge and we will.