I think the preservation is a huge, if somewhat unrelated issue. To recreate the text of one of these books people in the future will have to emulate the enviro

I think the preservation is a huge, if somewhat unrelated issue. To recreate the text of one of these books people in the future will have to emulate the environment the book exists on. In some sort of apolcalyptic future that destroys the linear progression of our technological innovation (and the ability to access old content with our new technologies as they appear) everything will be lost. The learning curve for/possibility of some future society having some rosetta stone moment that allows them to recreate and run a computer program is really hard to imagine. The monolith in 2001 a space odyssey might be a symbol of what people think we are about as a society. Our iPhones, Android phones and computers just strange blocks that are worshipped in their own rights. Who knows. But the barrier for understanding our culture from some temporal outside is growing extreme.