Safe storage can sometimes feel at odds with the need to provide appropriate access to language documentation materials. Things feel safer if nobody can touch them – but of course that would defeat the purpose of language documentation! The rules and principles that underlay appropriate access for language materials can be complex, and they can differ between communities, and within a community between different types of language materials.

Authorization includes rules around:

• who can access what materials;^{ⓘ Example} family members of a person might be authorized to access original recordings by that person, but non-relatives may not
• when materials should or should not be accessed;^{ⓘ Example} a story may be appropriately accessed only during certain times of year
• the use for which materials could be accessed;^{ⓘ Example} some materials might be ok to use by teachers who are creating lesson plans, but not by technologists who want to make a chatbot

Developing, sharing, and maintaining those rules and policies is an important part of ensuring appropriate access to materials.

Discoverability includes practices that ensure that authorized individuals can readily find the materials that they want or need. The creation and maintenance of metadata records for each item in a collection is a key part of discoverability. Metadata just means 'data about data', and you can think of a metadata record as a kind of library card for each element in a collection. The card should include any piece of information that you expect someone might want to search for. It is the who, what, when, where of the materials or data. An example might be an audio recording and metadata included to describe this piece of data might be things like: language(s) spoken, identifying person(s) speaking; when and where did it take place; content or context of the dialogue, identifying cultural content that may require restrictive access, etc.