>John M, correct me if I am wrong, but I do not believe that I have ever
 >seen anything the states that the evidentiary value of a document stored
 >on WORM is greater than the same document stored on a hard drive.

The evidentiary value doesn't give an advantage to WORM over other 
media, but that basically assumes that your records management 
procedures can stand up behind the documents.  Of course, most 
organizations aren't doing a good job when it comes to consistency or 
security.  That means it is easy to say that a document didn't follow 
the 'proper' procedures and how we know that is the right document.

What WORM does provide is a general belief that the data cannot be 
altered.  The SEC regulations regarding "write-once" technology are 
probably the best known, but there are a few others that pop up 
around the country by ill-informed but well-meaning government 
officials.  A few years ago AIIM had to help kill some federal 
legislation that would have inadvertently forced WORM storage.

The term and the technology have evolved to include a lot more than 
WORM disks.  EMC has been very successful in pushing their Centera 
product.  It uses magnetic media, but acts like a WORM disk in terms 
of it being impossible (well, nearly) to change the data.  It was 
specifically produced as a way to handle SEC transactions, but EMC's 
sales people have pushed it for use in "fixed address content" 
applications even when it isn't necessary from a business perspective.

As for CD disk longevity, there was a vendor that did offer 
certification for their LE-100 optical disks that went beyond media 
replacement.  I think it was Sony, but don't remember now.  In any 
case, they don't offer it now.  The differences in life expectancy 
are a little misleading anyways:  the same manufacturing process was 
usually used for an LE-35 or an LE-100 disk.  The only difference was 
how much money the vendor spent to do the certification.  Disks to 
delaminate and are vulnerable to environmental factors and we've seen 
disks delaminate in as little as 18 months.

But media hasn't been a problem for a long time and neither have file 
formats:  even today I can ready a 5.25" disk with a Volkswriter 
file.  But it does become more important.  Our general recommendation 
to customers is that they update the media and drives no later than 7 
years from their initial purchase and to do a review every three 
years.  At the time of the review, if they aren't confident of the 
media and drives being available for another five years they should 
plan on a conversion within the next four years.

-Dan


Dan Elam
Vice President
804-342-7400
Visit www.eVisory.com for unbiased information regarding document and 
records management technology.

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