---------- Forwarded Message ---------- Date: Sunday, March 03, 2002, 2:57 PM -0500 To: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU Subject: Digital Domesday Book lasts 15 years not 1000 Digital Domesday Book lasts 15 years not 1000 Robin McKie and Vanessa Thorpe Sunday March 3, 2002 The Observer It was meant to be a showcase for Britain's electronic prowess - a computer-based, multimedia version of the Domesday Book. But 16 years after it was created, the =A32.5 million BBC Domesday Project has achieved an unexpected and unwelcome status: it is now unreadable. The special computers developed to play the 12in video discs of text, photographs, maps and archive footage of British life are - quite simply - obsolete. As a result, no one can access the reams of project information - equivalent to several sets of encyclopaedias - that were assembled about the state of the nation in 1986. By contrast, the original Domesday Book - an inventory of eleventh-century England compiled in 1086 by Norman monks - is in fine condition in the Public Record Office, Kew, and can be accessed by anyone who can read and has the right credentials. -- _______________________________________________ Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup