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Friday, December 27, 2013

Free For All Friday No. 16: Capturing on Paper vs. Digitally

Many thanks to Mstraat for sending me the link to this article on capturing memories on digital devices vs paper, click here to see.

It makes a great point that when a notebook is lost, it's gone forever, but our social media is backed up in the Cloud. And overall it's quicker and easier to record more, and in different forms (text, photos, videos) digitally than on paper or film.

I've written before about my doubts about the longevity of memories recorded digitally. One hundred years from now we will still be able to read what's written on paper (if it's written/ printed in suitably archival ink) but I'm guessing the information currently in the Cloud will be long gone as technology is replaced. What do you think?

And as always on Fridays, feel free to discuss/ ask anything planner related!

10 comments:

  1. I'm not 100% sure about the validity of what I'm going to say but I'll say it anyway.

    Even though information lives in "the cloud", it still exists physically in servers. Servers are not invincible. Just recently, a video game development studio was flooded and they lost some of their data.

    Also, companies go in and out of business all the time. Look at MySpace. People used that to capture their memories but now it's no longer relevant. The data is still there but there's no guarantee it will be there forever. I personally feel the danger is even greater if you rely on apps. I feel like those are very short lived.

    As technology advances, I'm sure data in "the cloud" can be converted accordingly. It's a question of whether or not people will actually do it. For example: vinyl records and tapes. Some songs are not 100% lost. Just look on YouTube!

    Despite all I just said, I'm on your side (I think, anyway). I'd rather use pen and paper. There's a lot less to worry about (if you assume everyone still speaks English in a hundred years).

    That being said, no matter what form you decide to use, if you take the extra lengths to extend it's longevity, it could last for a long time.

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  2. I'm mostly with you, Laurie, but to be sure, here's what I do with my sketchbooks (I don't care as much about my journals, but if I did, I would do the same with them): I scan the pages as soon as a few are completed. Then I back up the digital files regularly (so far, on an external drive only, though I'm thinking of backing that up to the cloud, too). That way, I'm covered in as many ways as possible.

    - Tina

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    1. I'm with you, Tina. I like having things backed up so if I lose one, at least I'll have the other.

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  3. I cling to pen and paper because it has soul. For me, keeping notes, thoughts, and dates digitally does not have soul. I use an Exacompta "Journal 21 Planner" and keep both business and personal notes in composition books, which serve as my common place books.Although I happily use an I phone, I pad, and laptops, writing with pen and paper makes me feel connected with generations of writers, diarists, and scribblers over the centuries. My wife and I have been married for 40 years and together for 45,and we enjoy rereading the love notes and letters that we have exchanged over the years. There is romance in those sheets of paper that speak of something so powerful, and that cannot be matched by e-mail.

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    1. So true! And that's why I still send paper birthday cards. They're just SO much better than an ecard or email.

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  4. Privacy is my primary concern. I don't even put my to do lists in the cloud. The Internet is excruciatingly vulnerable to illegal intrusion and both natural and manmade electromagnetic fluctuations, and the less dependent we are on it, the better off we are. I am online so much that one of my 2014 goals is to reduce screen time, but all of my key online activities have an analog backup. Plus touch matters. I love to run my hands over a handwritten page. I love holding a pen, and being able to sketch or doodle in my planner pages. I vote to use both but think carefully about what you do online and keep everything truly important either completely on paper or backed up on paper.

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  5. I find that for my planning requirements; me and the digital world just told go together all that well. I like having a proper planner to go to for my plans. I find using my iPhone instead of a proper diary actually more cumbersome - call me odd but I prefer to open something to today's page and see what i'm doing rather than go through unlocking the phone, finding the calender and then opening up today's date. For storage of memories, i'm realising i'm relying far too much on digital and would rather have digital backs up as well as paper copies of the things I really want to keep.

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  6. I prefer paper. I have 20 years archived, I've always worried about a fire or some such thing. I have thought a lot over the years of how to insure them, but I believe there are concernes whichever way you go.

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  7. I think an overlooked problem of digital storage of information is that, because it is so easy to capture, far too much information is being stored, and much of it is extremely poorly indexed and inventoried. Keyword searching becomes less effective in larger pools of data. So the problem becomes not so much whether-the-information-exists but more can-you-find-it-when-you-need-it. And that is a major issue. Already "knowledge management" is becoming a huge priority in organizations to address this problem. A lot of people are much more careful about storing their paper files than they are about their digital files.

    I personally prefer paper; I prefer paper bills and pay those bills with paper checks. I diligently reconcile my (paper) bank statements against my (paper) check register and then file away the statements. I keep all receipts, filed appropriately. Sure, it could all go up in smoke but I find I just manage things better this way. I look over bills more carefully and am more conscious of how much money I am spending.

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  8. I totally agree with you on this one Joshua... the ease of keeping this info is almost out of sight and out of mind... which means you don't need to be as selective in what you keep

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