Introducing 'The Company Blog'

This is where you will find items of news, together with comment and notes on matters of concern, relating to records and archives, as well as editing and indexing.

The focus is mainly on Hong Kong and the surrounding region.  Although the intention is to provide information of value about recent and forthcoming events and issues, there will also be items on the lighter side, aimed to entertain as well as inform.

Campaign for Records Legislation Launched in Hong Kong

The Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong distinguishes itself by being the only jurisdiction in the East Asian Region that does not have legislation providing a statutory basis for the management of government records and archives.

To draw attention to the need for such a law, a report – entitled “Managing Public Records for Good Governance and Preservation of Collective Memory” – was published in March 2007 by Civic Exchange, a Hong Kong-based think-tank.  The text of the report is available on the Civic Exchange website at www.civic-exchange.org.   

The report sets out the background and case for legislation – in particular the requirement to establish a legal framework for proper government record keeping in line with international standards and best practice, to ensure the preservation of archival materials and a right of public access.

To date the Hong Kong Government has declined to engage in a dialogue on the issue, contenting itself with repeating its claim that current administrative guidelines are working effectively.

This is arguably not the case.  Since 2006, the media have reported on several leakages and losses of data, and on destruction and missing records from government agencies.

In the application for a judicial review brought before the courts in 2007 on behalf of Falun Gong practitioners who were refused entry to Hong Kong in 2003, the South China Morning Post reported that Mr Justice Hartmann commented: “It seems puzzling…that when this application for a judicial review was lodged just six weeks after the event, the director [of the Immigration Department] should possess no documents about anything that has anything to do with the matter.”

More recently, in March 2009, at the inquest into the death of a woman killed by a falling tree in Stanley on Hong Kong Island, the Coroner’s Court learned that some of the inspection reports on the diseased tree were missing.  The South China Morning Post reported that, of 17 reports compiled by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department on the condition of the tree only 6 could be produced.  Also that some of the reports had been submitted by e-mail and these might be lost.

Neither of these incidents appears to support the Government’s claim that its management of government records, including electronic records, is effective under administrative guidelines.

The Campaign Continues 

A public seminar on the management of public records and preserving heritage for good governance was held in Hong Kong on 7 March 2009.

The seminar drew on the knowledge of local and international experts on, and practitioners in, records management and heritage preservation to examine the status of records and heritage preservation and management in Hong Kong. 

Concerned professionals, academics and legislators have actively supported the campaign during the past two years through the media and questions in the Legislative Council, Hong Kong’s legislative body.

EASTICA Meets in Qingdao, China

The East Asian Branch of the International Council on Archives (EASTICA) held its 9th General Conference and Seminar at Qingdao in September.

Members and representatives from archives in China, including the Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macao, from Japan, South and North Korea and Mongolia were welcomed by Mr Wang Xiulin, Vice Mayor of Qingdao City Government, by Mr Yang Jibo, Deputy Director General of the State Archives Administration of China, and by Mr Masaya Takayama, President of the National Archives of Japan and Chairman of EASTICA.

The theme of the seminar was ‘Records in Crisis Management’.  Keynote speakers were Mr Preston Huff, Administrator of the S W Region of the National Archives and Records Administration of the United States, and Mrs Julia Marks Young, Director of the Mississippi Department of Archives & History, who both drew on their experiences of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Participants also heard reports from member countries on the seminar theme, and two case studies: from the Qingdao City Archives on filling the gaps in archives through an overseas copying project; and from the Hong Kong Heritage Project, a privately funded venture, which documents the history of the Kadoorie family and its companies and the life of Hong Kong.

Archives Training 

The post-graduate certificate in archival studies offered by HKU SPACE in conjunction with EASTICA (East Asian Branch of the International Council on Archives) that was planned for 2009 had to be postponed. New dates for the four- week course will be published as soon as these are known.

Also postponed was the EASTICA training project scheduled to be held in Ulaanbaatar in August for Mongolian archivists.  Flooding that caused loss of life and damage to the Mongolian National Archives building where the training was to have taken place resulted in cancellation of the program.

The records management component of both courses and the unique unit on English language terminology for records management and archives are taught by Don Brech, Principal Consultant of Records Management International Limited.

Dates for Your Diary - Meetings in the Asia-Pacific Region 

30 September – 4 October, 2009: the South East Asian Branch of ICA (SARBICA) will be holding a seminar on the digitisation of records and archives in Hanoi, Vietnam.

12 – 17 October, 2009: the Australian Society of Archivists (ASA), jointly with the Archives and Records Association of New Zealand (ARANZ) and the Pacific Branch of the International Council on Archives (PARBICA) will hold their annual conference in Brisbane, Australia.  Details are available on the conference website.

20 – 24 August, 2012: the next Congress of the International Council on Archives will be held in Brisbane, Australia.  For further information check out the websites at www.ica.org and www.naa.gov.au/whats-on/ica-2012. 

Business Records Group Established in Hong Kong 

Following the successful public seminar in held in March 2009 to promote the preservation of Hong Kong’s documentary heritage, the Business Records Group was established to further the preservation of business records of historical importance, and to provide advice on the administration of company archives and the management of modern records.

As a sub-committee of the Hong Kong Archives Society the Group seeks to raise awareness among the business community and the public at large of the importance of preserving company records in Hong Kong.

Personal Data Law under Review in Hong Kong 

A public consultation on the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance is currently underway in Hong Kong following a review of the Ordinance by the Hong Kong Government’s Mainland Affairs Bureau and the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data.

A consultation paper was issued in August containing a number of proposals for amendment of the Ordinance, which, like such legislation in other jurisdictions, has significant implications for record keeping.  A copy of the consultation document is available as a download from the website www.emab.gov.hk.   Members of the public are invited to send views and comments.  The closing date for submissions is 30 November 2009.

Before E-mail...the Telegram 

The telegram was the original long-distance text message based on the electrical-telegraph.  The earliest commercial telegraph systems were developed in the USA by Samuel F J Morse in 1837 and independently in Britain by Sir William Cooke and Sir Charles Wheatstone in 1839. 

Before long, telegraph wires and cables crossed countries and circled the world.  The age of rapid global communication was born.

The telegram – the actual message delivered on paper to the addressee – had its heyday in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, although it continues in limited use today.  British and Commonwealth citizens, for example, receive a telegram from the Queen of Great Britain on their 100th birthday.

As a form of correspondence the telegram is to be found among personal, business and public records in archival collections everywhere.

It quickly developed into an art form.  Since telegrams were charged for by the number of words sent, the objective soon became to convey as much information in as few words as possible.  It was a goal frequently achieved at the expense of clarity, as illustrated by the agent of film actor Cary Grant who sent a telegram inquiring “How old Cary Grant?”, to which the actor replied: “Old Cary Grant fine.  How you?”

While the telegram routinely played its part in business, government and journalism, for most ordinary people it became associated with the sending of congratulations on the birth of a baby and on a marriage – although not, as a rule, in that order – and with news of a death in the family, especially during wartime.

For others it was an opportunity to exercise their talent for humour or, inadvertently, demonstrate their idiosyncrasies.  Randolph Hearst, the American publisher, is reported to have sent the following telegram to a prominent astronomer asking: “Is there life on Mars? Please cable 1000 words.”  To which, being unable to give a definitive answer, the astronomer replied: “Nobody knows” – repeated 500 times.

The British novelist, G K Chesterton, who reputedly suffered from absentmindedness, once sent a telegram to his wife: “I am in Birmingham.  Where ought I to be?”  The wife’s reply was succinct: “Home.”

Record Quotes 

“I’m not going to have some reporters pawing through our papers.  We are the President.”  Hilary Clinton

“You ask me if I keep a notebook in which to record my great ideas.  I’ve only ever had one.”  Albert Einstein

“A clean desk is the sign of a cluttered desk drawer.”  Gene Walker

“The private papers left by Herbert Morrison were so dull and banal that they would have to be burned to provide any illumination at all.”  John Zametica

Taken from A Load of Wit by Des MacHale.