Can you still read your files from 15 years ago?

We are all creating new digital content every day: photos, documents, images, videos, etc.
But will we still be able to read them in 10 years time? Will historians be able to read them in 1000 years time?

Believe it or not, but this is already a real problem today:
Britain's National Archive estimates that it holds enough information to fill about 580,000 encyclopaedias in formats that are no longer widely available. And research by the British Library estimates that the delay caused by accessing and preserving old digital files costs European businesses about £2.7bn a year.

That's why the European Union is spending 4 million euros to to create a universal emulator that can open and play obsolete file formats.

Check out the full story on:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7886754.stm

Online Video Ads: Nail to the coffin of traditional TV?

Online Video adds are supposedly the next big thing.
Lots of firms are looking how to properly monetise video content on the Internet. The current models (e.g Youtube+AdSense), give low returns and are not sufficient to fund custom made content.

But where eyeballs are, the money will follow (YouTube is the 3rd most popular site on the Internet). Once this happens, it will all of a sudden be profitable to create professional content for the Internet and make money. The nail to the coffin of traditional tv?


Check out the current advertising model on:
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jan2009/tc20090126_305941.htm