The Sum Total of the World's Knowledge: 250 Exabytes

arkenian writes "The BBC reports on an article in Science about scientists who calculate that the sum of all the world's stored data is 250 exabytes. Perhaps more interestingly, the total amount of data broadcast is 2 zettabytes (1000 exabytes) annually. In theory this means that the sum of the world's knowledge is broadcast 8 times a year, but I bet mostly that's just a lot of American Idol reruns."

Comments

So, then, get the backlog done.

[G3ckoG33k]

So, then, get the backlog done.

It is about time we have high definition copies of all old texts, like the all hieroglyphs ever documented, all Babylonian texts, all Sanskrit texts, the Dead Sea scrolls, all Medieval hand writings, etc.

I guess all these together could not muster 1% of all the crap that is out there today. I wouldn't be surprised if all the foolish blabber-blobber-blubber on Facebook a single day outcompete all pre-1700 texts combined.

So, back to work. Get the backlog done.

Re:And a lot of it is free

[arkenian]

I swear I read 250 the first time I read the article. I must be getting blind as well as old. My apologies. (Although I grant, one would have hoped the editors would take the trouble to read the article and catch it.)