Records management is the area of general administrative management concerned with applying systematic analysis and control to processes whereby records required in the course of operating a business become archives. It aims to achieve economy and efficiency in the creation, use, maintenenance and disposition of these records. Here, the term "record" implies all sorts of information bearing media, regardless of form (be it paper, magnetic tape, machine-readble disks, microforms, parchment, papyrus, etc.), created by or for the organization running the business in question.

Archives, on the other hand, are a subset of these records in that they have passed an appraisal test, have been selected because of their possible value in other kinds of reference, and have been placed in an archival repository, or at least allocated to a permanent retention category. Following this, archives administration is the theoretical and practical study of policies, procedures and problems relating to archival functions, like acquisition, conservation, storage, arrangement, description, user services, etc.

There are various mailing lists on all aspects of archives and records management. No professional should go without subscribing to at least one of them. One can learn a lot even by just reading the messages posted. Of course, by participating in the discussions or simply by asking questions, one can get a chance to express his/her views, exchange ideas and learn things s/he is more interested in.

On the other hand, for the "lonely hunter" there are literally thousands of web sites to get information from. Some of these are sites of archival institutions from all around the world; some of them are sites carrying articles or other types of information that would be of interest to the archives/records professional; and some them are sites that carry a list and links to sites of the former types. Maintaining a site of this sort is a big issue. So, I play it the easy way by keeping a list of sites that carry links to others.

I have always been fascinated by poetry. Perhaps because of that rare talent of poets to express things in a much shorter and nicer way, I find slogans fascinating too. So, I have collected the slogans and humour that I came accross, mainly in the mailing lists, that relate to our profession in one way or the other.

Another rare talent that lightens up our lives is, of course, humour. So, I have added a Cartoons page. Hope you enjoy them too.

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