Re: reviewing ISO standards every 5 years, let me just point out that ISO
15489:2001 remains extant. Cough cough. :)

As far as the question goes, yes, there is a difference between silver and
gold CDs that has to do with the laminate layers and the chemicals used in
the process among other things. Gold CDs are generally higher quality and
all else being equal they will last longer.

But as many others have pointed out:
- "Longer" is a relative term, especially for those of you located in more
volatile climate areas.
- The reason music CDs last so long is because they are mechanically
pressed, not chemically burned.
- The bigger issue by far than the longevity of the media is the longevity
of the software required to read them. In other words, if some of those
documents are Word 95, or AutoCAD 12, it's generally not going to be a
media issue preventing access to them but the ability of Word or its
successors to read that proprietary encoding format.

So if you're talking about having convenience copies, sure, go for it - and
not sure gold/archival vs. silver make that much of a difference. If you're
talking about keeping records for decades, I'd argue that the best bet
today is either magnetic or solid state hard disk with regular backups and
migrations to then-current storage and file formats. It's not a good
answer, but it's better than all the other current approaches today to
ensure that you can read those documents well into the future.

-- 
Regards,

Jesse Wilkins, CIP, CRM
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blog: http://informata.blogspot.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/jessewilkins

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