Digital obsolescence

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Digital obsolescence is a situation where a digital resource is no longer readable because the physical media, the reader required to read the media, the hardware, or the software that runs on it, is no longer available. A prime example of this is the BBC Domesday Project. Cornell University Library’s digital preservation tutorial has a timeline of obsolete media formats, called the “Chamber of Horrors”, that shows how rapidly new technologies are created and cast aside.

The rapid evolution and proliferation of different kinds of computer hardware, modes of digital encoding, operating systems and general or specialized software ensures that digital obsolescence will become a problem in the future^[1]. Many versions of word-processing programs, data-storage media, standards for encoding images and films are considered "standards" for some time, but in the end are always replaced by new versions of the software or completely new hardware. Files meant to be read or edited with a certain program (for example Microsoft Word) will be unreadable in other programs, and as operating systems and hardware move on, even old versions of programs developed by the same company become impossible to use on the new platform (for instance, older versions of Microsoft Works, before Works 4.5, cannot be run under Windows 2000 or later).

The problem was brought to the attention of libraries and archives during the 1990s^[2], and has been discussed among professionals in those branches, though so far without any obvious solutions other than continual forward-migration of files and information to the latest data-storage standards. File formats should be widespread, backward compatible, often upgraded, and, ideally, open format. The National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage cites^[3] the following as “de facto” formats that are unlikely to be rendered obsolete in the near future: uncompressed TIFF and PDF (for images) and ASCII and RTF (for text).

[edit] Intentional obsolescence

In some cases, obsolete technologies are used in a deliberate attempt to avoid data intrusion in a strategy known as "security through obsolescence".

[edit] References

^ Rothenberg, J. (1998). Avoiding Technological Quicksand: Finding a Viable Technical Foundation for Digital Preservation. http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/rothenberg/introduction.html#longevity
^ Hedstrom, M. (1995). Digital Preservation: A Time Bomb for Digital Libraries. http://www.uky.edu/%7Ekiernan/DL/hedstrom.html
^ National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage. (2002). NINCH Guide to Good Practice in the Digital Representation and Management of Cultural Heritage Materials. http://www.nyu.edu/its/humanities/ninchguide/V/