Dear listener, you have been patiently enduring our headline-only episodes this season, so this week we have played our UNO Reverse card and present, for your consideration, only a couple of headlines and a single in-depth segment on capturing and digitizing the entire knowledge-set of our species. Yup, all of it.
Until the mid-20th century, our entire civilization’s knowledge could have been stored on a shoe box full of 1980’s era floppy disks. By 2025 it is anticipated that the total amount of data created, captured, copied, and consumed globally will reach 180 zettabytes, having more than doubled since 2020. For perspective, a zettabyte is one million petabytes, and a petabyte is one million gigabytes - this is no 5¼” floppy disk (yet!).
This episode tells the first part of the story: how our friends up in Redmond helped bring the traditional encyclopedia into the modern era. It’s a fascinating ride, and in the end, fairly amazing that it ever came to be in that form at all.
Also, in the spirit of Halloween, we felt no episode of Nonsense would be complete without a “Ghost of RMS” impression!
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How much space does all of humanity's knowledge take up? | Popular Science
Natural History (Pliny) - Wikiwand
The History of Microsoft Encarta
LaserDisc Database - Knowledge Disc [GEP85-010]
Encyclopædia Britannica - Wikiwand
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