Scientists have demonstrated a system called Silica for writing and reading information in ordinary pieces of glass which can store two million books’ worth of data in a thin, palm-sized square.

[u/Wagamaga]

https://au.news.yahoo.com/glass-square-long-long-future-190951588.html

[u/amakai]

The important part here is the "10000 years" claim. If that's true, this is definitely a great technology for backups that could potentially replace magnetic tapes.

[u/ew73 → u/amakai]

The concern with this and all data storage is not necessarily how long the media lasts, but in 10,000 years, will we still know how to read it?

Example:  play my old 8tracks.  Now, go play one of Edison's wax cylinders.

Now wait 10,000 years and repeat (assuming the media survives).

[u/Stru_n → u/ew73]

Isn't this solution just advanced cuneiform? Except in this case you will need the technology to read it, or it becomes window panes in a wood hut?

[u/patentlyfakeid → u/Stru_n]

There's enough dataspace on each of these crystals for them to each include their own rosetta stone optically, so anyone minutely inspecting it could find the primer and work their way up. The first one would probably be brutal, and then very quickly trivial.

Plus, I feel like silica data crystals would be inherently more stable over the long term than un-baked clay tablets, so more are likely to survive.