Thursday 27 October is the UNESCO World Day for Audiovisual Heritage. As well as celebrating the significance of audio and video recordings as historical documents, the day is a call to action. UNESCO warns that we risk losing much of our audiovisual heritage in the next 10 to 15 years if valuable recordings are not transferred to digital formats for preservation.

UNESCO’s Memory of the World program aims to protect our documentary heritage against destruction and neglect.

You can see the items inscribed on the Australian Memory of the World register here. It includes such notable audiovisual recordings as the surviving fragments of The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906) – which is also inscribed on the UNESCO International Memory of the World register – and the Cinesound Movietone Australian Newsreel Collection.

Read more about the 2011 World Day for Audiovisual Heritage.