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In a world where paper documents are being rapidly supplanted by electronic records, long term access to the data becomes critical. This is especially the case for legal contracts and government documents that stay valid and relevant over decades. GIZ is also facing this challenge. Just as pens and pencils are available from many manufacturers and vendors , document file formats and the applications which use them need to be supported by and available from multiple vendors. This guarantees long-term access to data, even if individual vendor companies disappear, change strategy, or dramatically change their prices. The digital format in which information is stored can either be “open” or “closed”. An Open Standard is one which is available for everyone to use, free of charge, and capable of being built upon – for example into new software products, without any limitations. Developers can use these to produce multiple software packages, services, and products by using these formats.
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