This is more of a mental hiccup than a technological one. The mental
template appears to have been "record the stuff electronically" and
then put it on a shelf, just like it was paper and forget about it.
Electronic stuff has to be migrated to new technologies as they come
available. I first saved my stuff on 5.25" disks, then 3.5"
diskettes, then Magento-Optical, now CD and who knows what after
that. The point is that there has to be an appropriate mental
template to go with the technology. File and forget is not going to
work.
Backup of data is the first step. Safe storage is the second. Migrate
the data is the third, and that should be done on a regular basis.
Lyle Browning, RPA
On Nov 22, 2006, at 6:04 AM, Randy Cabell wrote:
> So true. The first red flag came up some 10 or 15 years ago, when
> it was
> discovered that there were no tape drives left which could read the
> magnetic
> tapes of the 1950 census.
>
> More currently, I cannot read the 5 1/4 inch diskettes upon which all
> software and data were written and read by IBM PCs through the mid
> 1980's.
> And actually the last PC that I got does not even have the small
> (was it 3.5
> inch?) drive on it.
>
> I have heard that CDs have a tendency to come apart and/or lose
> data over
> time. And I have already experienced home-written DVDs which play
> with more
> and more errors over time, and eventually do not work at all.
>
> It is really ironic that IF you want to insure that you can read read
> records 50 years from now, your best alternative is the printed
> page, on
> acid-free paper of course.
>
> Randy Cabell
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Rosanna Bencoach" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Tuesday, November 21, 2006 8:48 PM
> Subject: [VA-HIST] Electronic records preservation
>
>
>> Worth reading...
>> "The Digital Ice Age," from Popular Mechanics' December issue.
>> http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/industry/4201645.html
>>
>> Rosanna
>>
>>
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