I was expecting more obvious suggestions to move all our stuff to google cloud "for the greater good". Apparently it was just a preparation…
But seriously, these complaints are dubious at best. Changing hardware? Well, maybe. Still, we won't migrate to newer hardware unless we can bring our stuff with us. Maybe only if 2D pictures will eventually be considered obsolete and never used since, but I doubt it as well. Changing software? I'm struggling to imagine how text documents could become unreadable. Even on completely new architecture it won't be hard to write a translator. The same way I cannot imagine bitmap images becoming obsolete, and every single format we use is just moderately complicated compression algorithm wrapped around bitmap, and every curious historian will be able to recreate it by himself. The same stays true for wav/flac,ogg,mp3, etc.
I can imagine how Adobe swf will become obsolete and it might be hard to find software to open it in 100 years. Or Microsoft Office slideshows. But it feel almost right.
But seriously, these complaints are dubious at best. Changing hardware? Well, maybe. Still, we won't migrate to newer hardware unless we can bring our stuff with us. Maybe only if 2D pictures will eventually be considered obsolete and never used since, but I doubt it as well. Changing software? I'm struggling to imagine how text documents could become unreadable. Even on completely new architecture it won't be hard to write a translator. The same way I cannot imagine bitmap images becoming obsolete, and every single format we use is just moderately complicated compression algorithm wrapped around bitmap, and every curious historian will be able to recreate it by himself. The same stays true for wav/flac,ogg,mp3, etc.
I can imagine how Adobe swf will become obsolete and it might be hard to find software to open it in 100 years. Or Microsoft Office slideshows. But it feel almost right.