Quote:
Originally Posted by Kali Yuga
That said, paper is no guarantee of longevity. Paper can be lost or destroyed, languages can change. I'd be shocked if any book in my collection is actually more than 50 or 60 years old, and I would not be surprised at all if there were tons of pulp novels or sci-fi short stories that are essentially lost forever.
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This is a very good point - huge amounts of genealogical and other records have been lost in the US due to courthouse fires. (If it sounds unlikely, try to do research on records usually stored in courthouses - you'll typically go back 60-70 years and find that all previous records were lost in a fire. A bunch of records concerning Viet Nam service members were lost to a fire in the early 70's. There's something risky about storing data on something as flammable as paper, too. (Although things are probably better since we're in the age of non-smoking in public buildings).