I'd say preservation efforts are as important as the films that inspire the work. Since we're not any closer to getting one massive movie with everything in it, it comes down to the fan editors to bring their visions to life and show us different views on the movies. Fan preservations can introduce new ideas or enhance old ones without destroying the underlying foundations, or they can completely change the flow of the story and bring a different path. Without them, as has been said, there wouldn't be Deleted Magic, Building Empire or Returning to Jedi. We wouldn't have the X0 project or Adywan's hugely anticipated 2004 revisitation or a whole host of other edits out there. The movies have inspired a great deal of creativity - surely that's the underlying reason for producing fan edits or preservations?

The official DVDs can always be improved on...as many projects have shown already, there is a massive colour problem with the recent releases - even Episode III shows that the Tantive was supposed to be a pristine white, not a washed over blue!