[xkcd 1683] Digital Data
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
We have stone tablets from back when humans invebted written language. I vote we back up critical data using this method.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
Yeah, though it has that issue with data density. The denser the data, the more likely it will become degraded from erosion or chipping.
Also if there's a discontinuity between our civilization and a future one, the denser the data, the less likely any future civilization would discover it's there, even if it still has enough integrity to be read.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
That really doesn't matter when someone screenshots your JPEG-XL and posts it in a website that transcodes it to WEBP and adds a water mark.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
I think there’s a good chance that a lot of the knowledge we have today could be lost entirely if civilization collapses to a certain degree just due to how we store it.
We do have some backups.
Arctic Vault
Preserving open source software for future generations
GitHub Archive Program (archiveprogram.github.com)
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
About that... we could record someone's every word and different people would read entirely different things into it. Consider how strangers have reacted to your own internet comments.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
Ray Bradbury famously directly told people they were interpreting Fahrenheit 451 wrong while he was alive and they still didn't believe it
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
Bradbury just complained that people were gonna stop buying his books. He gripes in multiple books that people dont read anymore since that's how he made money.
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ERROR: Earth.exe has crashedreplied to Amon last edited by
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The media on the internet will all eventually be behind a paywall. It seems like we're heading in that direction.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
Needs more jpeg.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
I love how unoriginal the human brain is sometimes. I had the same exact thing I was about to comment
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
Only downside is that only data that people care about right now is being saved. But what seems useless now might become valuable in the future. It's hard to grasp how much data has been forgotten on some old computers, or some CDs, or websites that have gone dark.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
But converting from a format to another is a lossy process. It's best to just keep whatever original format you have, unless you are creating the images yourself.
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[email protected]replied to [email protected] last edited by
It's hard to imagine how much data is lost on old notepads, journals, even personal voice recordings.
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Ready! Player 31replied to [email protected] last edited by
Trying not to spoil it but this is a plot point in a relatively famous, relatively recent sci-fi book, where the characters need to record a warning that lasts for millennia. They end up carving it into the rock of Pluto since all other data mediums would fail over that timespan.
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I do not know of this movie, but you're description reminded me of the most excellent read Deep Time, by Gregory Benford. Didn't consider other planets though, as this is actually a non-fiction work.