Your computer can’t read a floppy disk – so how do we save the history they hold?

By Hazel Ellis, PhD Candidate, Centre for Transformative Media Technology, Swinburne University of Technology
Melanie Swalwell, Professor of Digital Media Heritage

When you think of archives, you probably think of dusty old boxes of paper documents, photos, diaries, letters and flyers, filed away in storage. But increasingly, our archival materials are digital, and material from the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s are often stored on formats like floppy disks and CD-ROMs.

Aging and outdated technology has rendered decades of data, memories and cultural heritage inaccessible and at risk of being lost. The constant churn of computer hardware and software upgrades means digital content from as little as…

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