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Technically I agree this is completely possible, the challenges are more likely to be economic. How do you make sure the company exists 1000 years in the future

by phreeza 16y ago

Technically I agree this is completely possible, the challenges are more likely to be economic. How do you make sure the company exists 1000 years in the future? That question poses itself especially for a potential startup providing this service, but would even be relevant if an established company were to do it. If I were to trust anyone with doing this, it would probably be the catholic church. Can't think of anyone else with a sufficient track record.

pquerna 16y ago
Yes, surviving a societal collapse is pretty hard. I think a societal collapse, in which you assume the basic structure of of Capitalistic motivations failed, might only have 2 real outcomes: * Star Trek: Money becomes mostly pointless, and you hope with the altruism of other humans, the data is restored. * Mad Max: Welp, sucks for your data, it'll be lost in the sands of time. I think the more important perspective is, if you can make the first 200 years, the chances of someone else picking up the data increases massively -- right now most data is created and destroyed in years, never mind decades.
derefr 16y ago
All it would require is a society that honors, with full force, contracts with the dead. The problem is that this also creates inertia in our system of law: for example, what if someone signed their descendants into slavery 400 years ago? If we honored that contract, it would mean making an exception to laws against slavery. Similarly, whatever mechanisms or means the company is currently depending on to preserve its data might be made illegal in the future (because the information will have to be copied or updated to newer formats to maintain readability, no matter what it is, so there will necessarily be an intelligent component doing the translation.) If it just hires normal people to upgrade the data, capitalism might be abolished in the future. If it depends on religious devotion, religion might be disallowed from preserving private knowledge. If it creates an AI, that AI might later be found to be a slave, and set free...
jgriffith 16y ago
What if it wasn't a company? What if you created an "heirloom box" that stored all your important data. Your children could each have their own box to store their important data. Their box will be synced with your data as well. The grandchildren would have boxes that sync with their parents and the grandparents data. I could see these advantages: 1) As time goes on, these boxes contain a greater number of people's important data and become more valuable. 2) It is also somewhat secure, since the data is only in the hands of your children and grandchildren while you are alive. 3) Each generation would have a newer version of the box. The hardware is never obsolete.

by phreeza 16y ago

pquerna 16y ago

Yes, surviving a societal collapse is pretty hard. I think a societal collapse, in which you assume the basic structure of of Capitalistic motivations failed, might only have 2 real outcomes: * Star Trek: Money becomes mostly pointless, and you hope with the altruism of other humans, the data is restored. * Mad Max: Welp, sucks for your data, it'll be lost in the sands of time. I think the more important perspective is, if you can make the first 200 years, the chances of someone else picking up the data increases massively -- right now most data is created and destroyed in years, never mind decades.

derefr 16y ago

All it would require is a society that honors, with full force, contracts with the dead. The problem is that this also creates inertia in our system of law: for example, what if someone signed their descendants into slavery 400 years ago? If we honored that contract, it would mean making an exception to laws against slavery. Similarly, whatever mechanisms or means the company is currently depending on to preserve its data might be made illegal in the future (because the information will have to be copied or updated to newer formats to maintain readability, no matter what it is, so there will necessarily be an intelligent component doing the translation.) If it just hires normal people to upgrade the data, capitalism might be abolished in the future. If it depends on religious devotion, religion might be disallowed from preserving private knowledge. If it creates an AI, that AI might later be found to be a slave, and set free...

jgriffith 16y ago

What if it wasn't a company? What if you created an "heirloom box" that stored all your important data. Your children could each have their own box to store their important data. Their box will be synced with your data as well. The grandchildren would have boxes that sync with their parents and the grandparents data. I could see these advantages: 1) As time goes on, these boxes contain a greater number of people's important data and become more valuable. 2) It is also somewhat secure, since the data is only in the hands of your children and grandchildren while you are alive. 3) Each generation would have a newer version of the box. The hardware is never obsolete.