Let's develop an open-source media archive standard

[Vintage Computer Festival]

On Wed, 11 Aug 2004, Doc Shipley wrote:

>    Provisions for changing technology and loss of continuity are good,
> but we still need to draw the line at some point, especially concerning
> "external" archival of the archived data, i.e. zipped arcives and
> storage media.  To go to an extreme example, even printed ASCII on paper
> or mylar isn't reliable.  Paper may be just as archaic as hieroglyphics
> when the data is wanted.
>
>    We have to depend on ongoing maintenance of these archives.  If they
> are not periodically migrated to current media, and if the
> attached/imbedded documentation is not augmented to account for social
> and technical "loss of memory", future retrieval will be difficult, if
> not impossible, no matter what we do now.

That's where the Longnow Foundation may be able to play a rather
significant part in the development of this specification.

-- 

Sellam Ismail                                        Vintage Computer Festival
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International Man of Intrigue and Danger                http://www.vintage.org

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