archiving as opposed to backing up

From: Teo Zenios <teoz_at_neo.rr.com>
Date: Thu Sep 23 01:40:39 2004

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tom Jennings" <tomj_at_wps.com>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk_at_classiccmp.org>
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2004 1:44 AM
Subject: Re: archiving as opposed to backing up


> On Wed, 2004-09-22 at 21:56, Teo Zenios wrote:
>
> > People always talk about Atlantis because its something mythical
> > to search for, if it was documented 100% nobody would care, it would
> > be like
> > reading 10 years on income tax forms.
>
> Wow, so you're arguing that we should lose things so that those that do
> remain will be more interesting?!

No, I mean describe the Commodore 64 (as an example) enough so that somebody
might be interested enough to go dig one up and be able to repair it as
needed to run it. If we saved every C64 in mint condition so that people
1000 years from now are tripping over them still, nobody will want to use
one (just like people here today don't even want to look at a common 486 PC
running windows 3.11, but will fall all over themselves to get parts for
machines that are not common). Time along with apathy by the next
generations will end up loosing what we hold dear to us, our job is to leave
enough clues and tell a good enough story that future generations will want
to know more.

> > I really think people here collect computers because deep inside it
> > means
> > something to them, not because they want to preserve it for others.
>
> I agree that's probably true to some degree, large or small.
>
> > Do you
> > really want to document every single thing we treasure about a
> > specific
> > machine to the Nth degree so somebody even 20 years from now could
> > just look
> > it up as needed,
>
> Well, yes!

What a boring world that will be, like playing an old game you never seen
with the complete walkthrough in your hands never having to figure anything
out on your own.

>
> > or do you really wish something important was forgotten
> > from the archive so that somebody decides to find one, put it
> > together, and
> > find out what the hunk of metal really does?
>
> I find this idea really strange. So we should intentionally leave
> puzzles of the present for the future to decode?!

Yes why not, give them all the pieces and hopefully a few people will put
the puzzle together and test it out. People today have no reason to build
egyptian type pyramids, and we can build them if we wanted to with our
present technology. The Egyptians did leave alot of records on how they were
built and organised but archeologists are still not 100% sure how everything
was done and spend time and effort figuring it out and quite a few people
like reading about the finds and new ideas on how things were done. Our
computers are going to be the pyramids of the 3000's, not needed for their
society (in our crude forms) but a few people will be putting the puzzle
together just to see what we did and why and alot of people will be
interested in reading and contemplating the archeologists findings. It
doesn't have to be intentional. Some of the most basic things we do in life
that are so obvious to us and never documented will puzzle the hell out of
people 1000 years from now.
Received on Thu Sep 23 2004 - 01:40:39 BST