At 04:59 PM 6/2/2000 -0600, you wrote:
>
>A point to ponder:
>
>Have you ever wondered why languages 'disappear'? For example Egyptian
>hieroglyphs. Until the discovery of the Rosetta stone, they were just
>undecipherable pictures on the walls of graves.
>
>I fear the same problem is rapidly arriving with regards to computerized
>documentation.
>
>How many (normal) people have access to 9-track tapes, eight inch
>floppies, or even 5.25 inch floppies. All records that are
>stored in these formats are effectively lost to them.
>
>In 100 years is anyone going to even recognize a 9-track tape? Or
>paper tape? Or possibly even floppy diskettes?
>
>If an archeolgist digs up a CD-ROM in 500 years, how are they
>possibly going to decode the information stored on it. It is scrambled,
>encoded, ECCed, and stirred some more. Is it read from ID to OD (yes),
>or from OD to ID. Are they going to know what Red book, Yellow book,
>ISO 9660, or Joliet mean? Will they even understand English (or a
>close enough descendant)? Most Americans barely understand English
>(Kings English) as it was spoken 400 years ago (Shakespeare,
>Chaucer, etc).
>
>The point is, any form of long term archival must include enough
>information to allow an intelligent ignorant person to decode the
>archive. This information must be recorded in a fashion that doesn't
>degrade with time, and can be interpreted in the future.
>
>clint
Last year some of our local V.I.P'S buried a "time capsule" to be dug up
in a hundred years, and which included a VHS tape. While there are hundred
year old Edison cylinders around and the equipment to play them on, I doubt
they will have much luck with that VHS tape.
Regards
Charlie Fox
Charles E. Fox
Chas E. Fox Video Productions
793 Argyle Rd. Windsor N8Y 3J8 Ont. Canada
email foxvideo_at_wincom.net
Check out "The Old Walkerville Virtual Museum" at
http://www.skyboom.com/foxvideo and
Camcorder Kindergarten at
http://www.chasfoxvideo.com
Received on Sat Jun 03 2000 - 05:09:36 BST