Paul Conway wrote: I'm still curious to know how much data we each will have to play with?

So am I. It must be hard for them to decide since they have no idea really how well it will sell. and then how to price each MB. A possible way could be to allocate a percentage to each person depending on how much they paid also. So if 2 people paid £40 and £60 one person would get 40% of the available storage and the other 60%. The maths is simple enough in that case but I've no idea how they would implement that practically. and as the sales go up your % will drop. Meaning a constantly shifting allowance where £1 can change from say 5MB early on to 100KB at the end. Some sort of cut off point would be needed then where the value of data to £1 cannot go below a certain amount. Even then it's not as simple as that. I wouldn't be surprised if it takes them a few months or a year to figure it out.

Also Fawkes they need to somehow take in to account the future trend in data storage, what I mean there is 1TB hard drives are fairly common now. SSD drives are getting bigger all the time etc etc.

Martin P wrote: Also Fawkes they need to somehow take in to account the future trend in data storage, what I mean there is 1TB hard drives are fairly common now. SSD drives are getting bigger all the time etc etc.

True true. Data storage has already progressed extremely rapidly. I'm currently using a 1TB hard drive my self which is pretty much full. 10 years ago such a thing couldn't be imagined for just a simple PC. Maybe the 1TB hard drive will become as obsolete as the floppy drive is to us by the time LM1 launches. Then there are things like data compression to consider. It will be a big headache for LM1 and I don't know how they can decide or even if they can for several years.

That's all true Fawkes.
I've downloaded a number of movies & tv onto my 1TB HDD and a typical 1080p HD Film takes up around 1-2GB so
as you can see that's many hundreds of movies can be saved on just this one very small box

By the time this wonderful mission launches this will be old news.

I'm still surprised there has been no idea of what each of us have purchased with regards to Data storage but if
I had to guess (with millions of people expected to add their films, photos, music and data) I'd make a starting
guess at around this 1-2GB which would give you around 2 hours of (1080) footage or a combo of video, photo's etc
but this might well increase as the tech gets better and more advanced.

I also wonder when we'll get the vouchers and when we'll be able to start uploading stuff?
This moment will be fun as I'm assuming (if permission is given by the uploader) we'll be able to see much of it
If I make ours public you'll us as a family celebrating Manchester City's first Premiership Title....crazily

Hi All, I've been meaning to jump on board this topic for some time, but other demands keep getting in the way! Doug, Fawkes, Stavy, Martin, Paul, and Abi: thanks for such thought provoking contributions.

The LM1 Archive is such a critical area of the project it's sure to require a mountain of thought. Here are just a few questions that come to mind and I haven't even touched upon the practical issues...:

What will be the principles of inclusion and exclusion of content on the Public Archive?
How might an "archival constitution" be arrived at? Through voting? Who votes? By what other means?
Who decides on and authors the final draft of public archival principles?
Who makes content editorial decisions? Paid staff? Partner experts from educational institutions? Members of the community?
How important is it to ensure those who decide on content for the public archive are representative of an international community?
How does the project ensure the content in the Public Archive is not culturally biased? Is this inevitable and why does this matter?
Will those making editorial choices about what is included (or not) be accountable?
If so, what are the mechanisms of accountability?
When there are disputes about content, how will they be dealt with?
What defines "the right balance of content"? - scientific, cultural, etc. Here's how Wikipedia organize their portals:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Contents/Portals

There are many ways to report the same event. How will these different perspectives be presented in the Public Archive?
Will the archive be family friendly?
If the archive has explicit content, who will judge what is acceptable and what is not?
Who is the final arbiter of content? The Director of the Public Archive?
And so on, and so forth...

Perhaps one of the first undertakings of the development of the Archive at LM1 Labs in August will be to set out these questions and far more that need to be asked, along with a model of how they might be answered. There's going to be enough to keep all of us busy for a long time!

Other demands certainly get in the way for us all Mike!

Excellent thoughts and a lot of food for thought in your post.

Personally I think the Public Archive is a huge undertaking and you've made that very clear in the detailed contents of your post. It is certainly one aspect of the mission (and beyond) that will benefit from as much varied input as possible. It's also something of great importance, but to some may not of course seem as exciting as scientific, technological, and other aspects of this project.

There is a section in the Lunar Labs which I think will deal with the Public Archive, as it will with the other areas of the project. Much of what you say might ultimately be thrashed out there as well (or I hope it would be). It would be good to keep the discussion, thoughts and ideas on the Archive going on this Forum in the meantime, and perhaps make it something of worth to be redirected towards, or used in tandem with Lunar Labs in time.

With the wanton destruction of ecology, heritage and more of the same that goes on in our world on a constant basis, I also feel that the Public Archive is for this very reason something of great importance and worth. The fact of recording and storing of our existence and past is essential for the future. Without the past (or indeed the present) there can be no future.