I forget if I reported this anecdote, but as part of my public history  
program in graduate school I attended a lecture by a fellow from the  Smithsonian. 
He showed slides of an entire wing set aside and full of  evolutionary stages 
of computers in 1986. They finally stopped collecting  because the technology 
has changed so rapidly. He also reported that the super  computers used to 
read the Armed Forces records of the Viet Nam War started out  as twins, but when 
we retreated from Saigon in 1975, that computer was left  behind ... and when 
they got the files back to the U.S, they found the sibling  computer had 
changed dramatically... so much that it could not read the files  from Viet Nam; 
to this day, no one can read those files. His conclusion was that  nothing can 
beat hard copies of acid-free paper that is stored in cold, dry  rooms with 
little UV light, no dust, and no critters. I see nothing has really  changed 
when it comes to long-term storage of photo digital images.
 
Ron May
Legacy 106, Inc.