There is a new term floating around the digital photography world these days. It could actually be a major field of study or employment in the near future if we're not careful. That term is digital archeology. What does it mean to photographers exactly? Well, in the extremely short period that computers and digital cameras have been in existence there are countless formats and technologies that have become extinct to the point where they are useless or unreadable. In fact this is happening on a yearly basis to the point of epidemic proportions and it needs to be addressed immediately. Let me explain...

Around the world, many governments and countries are not relying on digital storage yet. They convert many of their historical documents to paper or microfilm immediately because this is the only universally recognized archival format available today and the only one that is trusted to stand the test of time. Even the U.S. National Archives converts a lot of their information to something other than digital because they have no real hope that in the near future digital content will be readable. NASA has admitted that over 20% of the information sent back from the first Mars space probe is no longer readable because the information retrieved was stored technology that is now extinct or no longer supported by the vendor that created it. What a scary situation we face today. In my eyes, the digital information we're creating today could be created or printed on something similar to degradable paper because over the course of time it may slowly just disappear back into the earth or disappear without a trace.

Now, this is an extreme example and the photographic file format issue is not as challenging as these examples state because we are dealing with popular programs, technologies, platforms and formats that are currently widely accepted into our culture. So the chances that you'll be able to open a .JPEG file sometime in the next 20 years is decent — if not guaranteed. But there are still rouge formats, applications, database technology, etc. that will only work with certain formats. Plus there's no guarantee that next year a new format will come out and catch on. Over the course of the next 20 years .JPEG could become an extinct format too although highly unlikely. Regardless, we do have a serious issue to face when choosing the method and format of digital photo storage and this is a good place to get into the "guts" of our archiving discussion.

Article Author: Christopher Auman

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