DVDs and the Olden Days

[forestgrove]

when I try to play a DVD but there are too many scratches on it from previous users at the library, I struggle to watch even a single episode before it jams, chokes and refuses to play any further or even causes the dvd player program to jam and require either manual ejection of the disc or a force quit

Comments

[breakman6]

totally mirrors my own thoughts.

[doktor_quack]

It's funny you bring up DVDs being scratched. One of my fascinations recently has been archiving and the problems associated with record-keeping in the digital age. For each unit of information, an encryption key, so to speak, is required to make that information useful to the interpreter. For instance, we all have an ingrained encryption key called "literacy" that allows us to decipher the English language (obviously