Re: Titanosaurs from Malawi

["Richard W. Travsky" <rtravsky@uwyo.edu>]

On Sun, 22 May 2005, Phil Bigelow wrote:
> [...]
> In the year A.D. 2200, will reader equipment still be backward compatible
> with today's CD drives?  If not, then will today's science librarians
> have enough money in their budget to pay for the transfer of all of the
> old CD format publications into a newer archival format before their old
> CD drives conk out?  And how long *does* the protective plastic coating
> on a CD last, anyway?

One does not have to project to 2200 AD to already encounter this problem.

Try reading a 6 track 200 bpi tape these days. Or paper tape. 6 bit
display code. Or even a 5.25" disk!

> [...]