Most recent update: 16th July 2022 - 21:18:24
- 1524 characters
The default for computing is data loss
We should likely warn time travelers that even though their phone is a modern marvel of connectivity, compute, and storage (at least compared to anything of their era) they're still likely to lose text documents.
I haven't pulled apart the entire story, and what tragedies have resulted in the behemoth of modern computing being fallible here, but that still stands as true.
A writer is still likely to lose their novel or their PhD.
A coder is still likely to lose a database, almost regardless of their level of sophistication.
Your friend circle is still likely to lose their discussions and "memeography" as they shift from one transient communication platform to the next.
- Local data: you're likely to have three devices, a few hundred megabytes / gigagbytes of irreplaceable data, and we'll still expect to lose it
- Local databases: the OSS default isn't trivial to use / set up and resiliency instead relies on paid closed source PaaS extensions
- Cloud data: exporting your own data but limited in what is connected to you, let alone relevant to the broader ecosystem
- Nearly equivalent: importing lossily from one service to the next
- Transient data and experiences: game servers that will shut down and never return, file formats that at best require data archaeology, vital data lost in reams of banal statistics, ...