[therealidiot]

I've started using M-DISC Blu-rays for my backups, which are supposed to last for quite a long time. I don't know how long they will actually last in real-world conditions, but I'm hoping its long enough that if I ever need them, they'll still work.

As for preserving things for future generations, I don't know of any good storage techniques. The problem with M-DISCs and other mad-high-density digital storage is that the readers will (most likely) be completely unavailable long before the all of the discs have degraded.

Perhaps we should engrave our data in 2D barcodes, alongside some readable instructions describing how the data can be decoded... Wouldn't have anywhere near the density of optical, magnetic or flash storage though. The whole situation does "worry" me a little, I agree entirely about future researchers not having much to go on.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC