Fascinating initiative from PLANETS (Preservation and Long-term Access-through Networked Services)–a four years’ project, co-financed by the European Union’s within the 6th Framework Programme which aims to create services that enable long-term preservation and accessibility to all our digital information, whether cultural or scientific.

On May 18th, just two days ago, Planets reached an important milestone by placing a “time capsule” in a Data Center located in Switzerland to draw attention to the importance of preserving digital information over the long term. The capsule contents were 5 different, most popular storage formats and the technology to read them. To make this a real time capsule, files were stored in media ranging from punch-cards (remember those?) to paper, microfilm, floppy disc, audio tape, CD, DVD, USB and Blu Ray.

The Data Center is called Swiss Data Fort Knox and is in the town of Saanen, Switzerland: it is carved into a mountain of the Alps to ensure the physical security in a project that originally involved the Swiss army.

Still physical security is only a part of the problem. The project aims to emphasize the need to preserve the methods of access to digital information and preserve it with the readers needed to ensure future accessibility.

In case anyone still thought that the DVDs do not degrade over time.

Tags: digital data, digital information