Backup Strategy

[dix]

Very cool article MLC. Paper prints of films! Who knew? ...you did I guess. When you think about it paper is amazingly durable media. Better than mag even. Maybe I should print out my tracks as piano roll! ...although I suspect modern ink from printers today might not be as durable as old school printers.

Archiving for posterity isn’t something I’ve thought about much, and not the intent of the OP I don’t think, but it is an interesting subject.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

I've already realized that my digital work probably won't survive unless it's attached to a film, TV, or radio show that's been otherwise archived. I've got CD. DVDs, and hard drives full of music spanning from about 1988 when digital hit my studio. Some of that stuff is already not retrievable (bad CDs, locked in Atari format, etc.). Virtually everything prior to that (and on paper since) is within reach. If/when we die LOL... who knows what will happen to all our hard work? Maybe end up in a thrift store, or a landfill, of recycled into flyswatters.

And paper is no guarantee the work will survive. Only it's best chance in terms of technology letting future generations down as far as retrieving the work we're doing now. Even the internet is subject to an untimely demise. All that has to happen is the server holding our work goes south or the corporation holding it decides it's not worth saving, and poof! A lifetime of creation can be gone with a button push.

I hate to sound so nihilistic, I'm not. I'm actually an optimist, but I'm also a realist. So getting back o/t... when I see threads on backup plans, I always find them shortsighted, regardless of the wonder technology we're using to keep our temp backups. That wasn't such a big issue to me a few years ago, but at 65, one does have to recognize that we won't be here forever and if we don't plan ahead to allow our work to survive, quite simply, it probably won't. I truly don't want that to happen to me, or to you, or any other artist (even Pia Zadora!).