PC: crashed. Perhaps irretrieveably. Wont boot
Laptop:came home in a coffin from Computer Hospital
Lessons: back up stuff to somewhere failsafe eg photos to memory stick (but dont lose it); keep paper copies of registrations and receipts of purchases etc in a fire and waterproof box; save things to the net or to disc (although I have lost that disc my dad sent me of my daughters son); dont treat a computer as a permanent record; learn how to re sync an ipod; make sure you have a valid copy of Windows; dont be a cheapskate when getting stuff off the internet; dont be paranoid because Windows will get you in the end; keep a child with a surplus PC in reserve to maintain access to the WWW; persuade that child to leave home with just his laptop. It is all so superficial and fleeting
Basically, if you want to keep it, a computer isnt the right place, just like you wouldnt take anything you want to keep to Glastonbury. We are all here for a short time, and computer records arent going to pass anything down to our descendants, except when in the hands of the Authorities with their billions of pounds to waste on failing centralised computer records. We are all going to die eventually, and how we pass on our records to future generations is a gamble. Yes we have inscriptions from Hittite and Egyptian traders, kings and priests, but we dont have any photos of how they lived, so there is no reason to think our dodgy records will be around in a few hundred years.
*opts to sit round campfire with small children, exchanging stories, that way, memory is passed on on and we live forever (well, as long as humans stay on the planet until it gets its revenge)
5 comments:
Homer's Iliad and the other one, thingy, can never spell it right... they were both passed on by memory alone at first. Then some clever dick invented writing, I suppose.
Now when I rant on about all this, my kids turn round and say "Having a Luddite five minutes are we?"...
Glad it's not just me...
"save things to the net or to disc" just to warn you, don't treat a CD as a permanent record either, or the net.
CDRs die after a few years ~3 for the cheapest ones if you don't keep them in the dark. Secondly, I'd never trust the net to keep a backup for me (unless it was a professional backup company), far too volatile.
like you say, paper is the best storage medium, or madly enough... computers :-) just make sure you keep a current copy of everything on more than one harddisk in more than one computer and keep them synced :)
Tell stories to your grandkids from birth and they will in turn become storytellers.
Now shove up and make room around that fire for a little one....
Will the grandkids listen while the playstation beckons from the corner?
It's no help to you now, but there is the data security maxim "no data exists unless it exists in two places"
Don't lose hope for your data. If the PeeCee is busted but the disk is good it can be put in another PeeCee and become drive D.
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