The Communication Archive

Ever since humans have been communicating, we have been keeping communication archives. In prehistoric times, it was cave paintings, to the Bible to the Quran, etc. Ever since we have been able to keep a record in some form of written mechanism, we have technically been archiving this data for not only the current generation, but future generations ability to look back on earlier times.

As we continue to evolve in terms of how we communicate and the technology that surrounds us, we 'Archive' in new ways. The electronic archive. Some people feel as though we've changed the world in terms of this new concept called "archiving." Technology is merely giving us a new place to store our communication archives. It's not on the side of a stone, but within a little black box on a shiny metal round disk.

From the beginning of "Modern History", we have been able to trace back historical records through written notes of historical events, "archives." Now imagine the world 500 years into the future. What are historians going to be able to search through to create history books? Will the "electornic age" become the second coming of the "dark ages" because nobody will be able to figure out why we didn't keep written records of events? Historians will find these little metal boxes with shiny round disks in them and have no idea where all of our paper is.

Maybe we can't find much written history from the original dark ages because they already had email archives and we just can't figure out how to read them or where they were stored? :)

When chosing a new archive solution, keep in mind how you will adapt your current archive and even the next version of your archive. When implementing your new archive, don't forget about your old data. Keeping your archived data in the most current format will allow for easier transitions and migrations in the future and keeping future historians with something they can read and understand in 500 years.

Don't let this become the second dark age in history, keep your archived data current.