John Lawson wrote:
>
> Without going into a lot of extraneous detail.. I am on several
> comittees and groups etc., involved in the restoration and
> preservation of films, sound tracks, and video media.
>
> All the high-techsolutions notwithstanding, one of the long-term
> archival methods is still an optically-recorded signal on stablized
> mylar or estar-based photographic film of some kind. With the
> proper care in processing the film life is forcast to be in excess
> of 500 years, and all that is required to 'read' it is a light
> source and a photo-responsive device.. plus the algorithms to
> recover the intelligence from the data stream. In the case of
> purely analog info, an audio amp, speaker, (and knowing the
> language) are the only recovery criteria. Data is a little more
> complex, but hopefully in 2100 somebody will be able to translate.
>
> Unless we've managed to reduce ourselves to cave-man status once again.
Well, we've never managed to reduce ourselves to cave-man status since
that condition was left, unless you count folks building underground
homes for ease of climate-control. Contrary to popular imagination,
there was no loss of technology from the fall of the Roman Empire and
"Atlantis" was a result of poor records of a non-existant Golden Age
before the Cretan civilization was wasted by a volcano -- after all,
if times are hard Grandpa always says "in my grandpather's day ...",
but if times are good he says "why, when I was a kid we had to ...".
Legends build from there.
--
Ward Griffiths <mailto:gram_at_cnct.com> <http://www.cnct.com/home/gram/>
WARNING: The Attorney General has determined that Alcohol, Tobacco,
and Firearms can be hazardous to your health -- and get away with it.
Received on Mon Jan 18 1999 - 17:52:50 GMT