Subject: | |
From: | |
Reply To: | |
Date: | Thu, 26 Oct 2006 10:03:50 EDT |
Content-Type: | text/plain |
Parts/Attachments: |
|
|
Deborah Tamborski asked about problems in archiving electronic records
and if it would be "possible" to read them 50 years hence.
I shall not attempt to top Bill Roach's brilliant explanation of the
difficulties in keeping electronic documents viable but I do argue that
it is most likely that our successors will be able to read our
electronic files--if they really care to.
Remember that there was something like an 1,800 year gap between the
last Egyptian and the first Frenchman who could read hieroglyphics. To
read the Epic of Gilgamesh linguists had to resurrect an alphabet and a
language that had been dead for millennia and they did so without the
help of computers. More recently scholars did the same to read Mayan
inscriptions. And with the help of computers classical scholars are
beginning to read charred papyrus scrolls from Pompeii and expect to
recover many ancient works. A few weeks ago there was an announcement
that a long-lost work of Euclid was recovered even though a Christian
monk had scraped its words from the page and written a book of prayers
over it.
It would seem that the only documents that are irretrievably lost are
those that have been physically destroyed. Are magnetic tapes, optical
disks, and punch-cards really all that much different from clay tablets,
stone, and organic media?
Paul R. Scott, CA, CRM
Records Management Officer
Harris County, TX
List archives at http://lists.ufl.edu/archives/recmgmt-l.html
Contact [log in to unmask] for assistance
|
|
|