[ARSCLIST] Stored Information--was: The ways CD's and DVD's can fail.

["Steven C. Barr(x)" <stevenc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Karl Miller" <karl.miller@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>   I wonder how the general population would react, especially when one
considers that, according to some estimates, well over 50% of all of our
information exists only in digital form.
>
About 99% of the general public, being only concerned with information
that somehow promises them a profit (or specifically concerns them,
their kin, usw.) would be totally UNconcerned with that statistic!!

The simple fact is this: every time a human being dies (or is
otherwise rendered unable to access or communicate the contents
of his/her/its memory) there is a certain amount of information
that is totally and irretrievably lost!

Here, we once again run into what I call (not entirely facetiously...)
"Barr's Thirteenth Law Of Information"...to wit:

99% of all information has no value at any future date (although
it might be interesting to someone[s]). The remaining 1% will be
not only valuable, but vital to society at some now-unknown
future date!

First corrolary: There is absolutely no known way to identify
in which of those categories information will fall...

Steven C. Barr