The government and public institutions produce and receive a wide variety of publicity materials, and they are just interested in public relations itself without paying attention to the post- management of printed publicity materials such as posters, ...
The government and public institutions produce and receive a wide variety of publicity materials, and they are just interested in public relations itself without paying attention to the post- management of printed publicity materials such as posters, pamphlets, brochures, banners or stickers. As publicity materials are viewed not as a sort of archives but merely as promotion tools, they have mostly been neglected and scrapped or remained damaged.
Even those who wake up to the importance of publicity materials just take care of them without allowing for their characteristics. Since publicity materials are out of the coverage of the archives management act, they are merely treated as things, and even important publicity materials remain damaged. The materials are definitely underestimated, not being regarded as documents. Some believe that publicity materials don't belong to the category of archives due to their unique characteristics.
publicity materials are the products that have been produced or received by the government or public institutions during official work performance, and they are evidently archives that are valuable in terms of administration, information and verification. Publicity materials contain various kinds of information on politics, election, events, welfare, health care, government agencies or national policies that people should be informed about, and they are also used as part of enlightenment drive. The information included in publicity materials has a firsthand or secondhand impact on people in general. Hence the materials are a mirror of contemporary society and apparently part of archives that are worthwhile symbolically and historically. Therefore publicity materials should be managed as primary national and public archives to which the archives management act should be applied.
The legislation of the archives management act in 2007 makes it possible to take care of publicity materials as documentary art records, one of special archives. Although publicity materials belong to the category of documentary art records, there were neither separate regulations on the materials nor specific statement on the definition and range of documentary art records. Therefore the act is likely to throw those who manage documentary art records and publicity materials at national archives or relevant institutions into confusion.
Publicity materials might not be viewed as part of documentary art records in that they hadn't long been looked upon as archives and most publicity materials are made of paper, not video. Furthermore, the current relevant policies and acts don't specify the definition and range of archives, and it's consequently likely not to rate publicity materials as official archives.
The relevant policies and acts should determine the definition and range of publicity materials in order for them to be well managed as archives and documentary art records, and a separate management system for documentary art records and publicity materials should be built to ensure the right management. To facilitate the right use of publicity materials, the materials should be managed in light of their characteristics. To make it happen, specific guidelines should be prepared about the management and conservation of publicity materials. That is one of the sure ways to correct the way of looking at publicity materials and guarantee the right management, conservation and use of the materials as the important archives of the nation.