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Re: [ARSCLIST] CD markings
On Thu, 30 Sep 2004, John Ross wrote:
> No matter which choices we make today, our successors will probably have to
> spend time and resources converting or transferring today's digital
> archives to new formats and media. The alternative, which the data
> archivists are facing now, is that the archived material will be preserved
> but unplayable; I don't know if it's true, but I have been told that the
> raw records of the 1960 U.S. census exist only on computer tapes in a
> format for which there are no surviving tape readers.
>From personal experience...as a consultant to the State of Texas
Department of Information Resources...they had tapes with no reader and
sent them to the Smithsonian to have them read. They then had to engage
help from a company that could provide analysis and read the information.
Much of the reading I have done on the subject indicates that this is just
the beginning of our troubles. And we thought we had troubles with acidic
paper...
Karl