:: Netspeak Archive ::

A PAPERLESS office was one of the early hypes of the information technology world. But the technological obsolescence of data storage devices and the consequent inability to retrieve data from an older medium casts doubts on this "paperless office". I still remember the big 8-inch floppies that were used to store data in my organisation some years ago. When we changed our system, all of a sudden the invaluable data stored in the big floppies became absolutely useless. We are unable to read information recorded just a few years ago but can preserve and read even centuries-old documents recorded on paper. We need then to find a better storage mechanism that will adjust to technological change and transfer the data automatically to the new medium without the user's intervention. The Net-based on-line backup services may be the answer.