n.the usefulness or significance that accrues to a record for only a limited period of timeAngel 1953, 17These schedules, which are extensions of the general schedules initiated by the National Archives in 1946, contain appropriate instructions for the retirement of records of enduring value, as well as for the disposal of records of relatively short-term value.Shiff 1956, 116In addition, the elaborate accounting procedures now evolved for costing, budgeting, depreciating, and auditing give rise to a mass of material, much of which is of short-term value only, and most of which has to be interpreted before the layman can understand it.Thexton 1974, 38In addition the reports and summaries prepared on the computer were printed for further reference and study. The numerical data used in preparing the reports and summaries were thus of short-term value only and had little potential for archival purposes.Levine 1979, 79Transfer records regardless of their lack of historical or research value. Masses of such records stored in basements or attics may be offered for placement in a depository. The archivist must use appraisal talents very critically if the regional depositories are not to become warehouses for record series of abort-term value.Stephens 1998, 3The number-crunching applications that dominated business computing from the 1950s to the 1980s were characterized by data that tended to have relatively short-term life cycles and retention value. Since most IS departments had few if any applications having multi-decade or permanent retention requirements, the creation and maintenance of an electronic archives was a non-issue during this era. However, the paradigm shift from electronic records of short-term value to those having long-term, archival value is certain to occur for several reasons.van Houten 2010, 31Removal of transitory records (i.e., records with temporary or short-term value) that are no longer needed.NARA 2018bResearch data commonly have short-term value when they are narrow in scope and can be replicated by a new experiment if necessary.
Notes
Records that only have short-term value will be scheduled for eventual destruction. However, short-term value may still require that records must be retained for many years, since the term of retention is compared against the need to keep some records forever.
