American Scientist's recent article on data preservation raises the spectre of a “digital dark age” if archival techniques are not properly The magazine American Scientist, recently ran an article on data preservation which raises the spectre of a “digital dark age” if archival techniques are not adequately maintained.

   With most data in the future being digital through the inevitable tide of technological progress, the standards and practices we use in these early days of the information age may lend toward gaps in the records for future generations.

  Multiple failure points can occur as time marches on. A failure to keep “Rosetta Stones” that allow us to transit from one storage format to another, or to do so with accuracy, may create holes in our collective knowledge. Like Creutzfeld-Jacob Syndrome, holes in our digital “brains” that form the basis for not only the current World Wide Web, but for a future WWM (World Wide Mind) that links our minds to cyberspace avatars and each other, could form.

   An “upgrade” on such a future system which fails to maintain backwards compatibility, could revolutionarily create a loss of vital data necessary for the functions of an ever faster-paced civilization to run. Imagine the science fiction future of the Star Wars capital world of Corrisuant; streams of flying cars falling from the sky, markets collapsing in moments, artificial limbs that no longer work, billions of people without water supplies or power or heat. A planet of tens of billions thrown into chaos.

Now, step back and imagine that today. Our manuals that allow engineers to manage the power at a nuclear plant, pump clean water from our resovoirs, and deliver gas to our homes. If those manuals were not backed up on paper, as they (mostly) are today, but rather on a PDA like a Kindle or Blackberry or Ipod or Android Smartphone, then the consequences could be just as dire for our civilization. No heat or electricity or water in urban areas could make our cities look like disaster areas.

   This latter future is not nearly as far away as some Luke Skywalker fantasy. It is plausible that, in the next ten years, we have such a switch to digital technology in critical walks of life.

   The impact of data loss, whether by truly losing information or an inability to access it, could spell harsh lessons for us in the near future. Back up you data, keep candles and batteries and water available, and have an emergency radio handy!