this post was submitted on 20 Dec 2023
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294
UK plan to digitise wills and destroy paper originals "insane" say experts (www.theguardian.com)
submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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UK plan to digitise wills and destroy paper originals "insane" say experts::Department hopes to save £4.5m a year by digitising – then binning – about 100m wills that date back 150 years

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[–] [email protected] 20 points 10 months ago

This is an idea straight out of science fiction that was meant to be a warning, not a guide. From "Rainbow's End" by Vernor Vinge.

Tiny flecks of white floated and swirled in the column of light. Snowflakes? But one landed on his hand: a fleck of paper. And now the ripping buzz of the saw was still louder, and there was also the sound of a giant vacuum cleaner...

Brrrap! A tree shredder!

Ahead of him, everything was empty bookcases, skeletons. Robert went to the end of the aisle and walked toward the noise. The air was a fog of floating paper dust. In the fourth aisle, the space between the bookcases was filled with a pulsing fabric tube. The monster worm was brightly lit from within. At the other end, almost twenty feet away, was the worm's maw - the source of the noise... The raging maw was a "Navicloud custom debinder." The fabric tunnel that stretched out behind it was a "camera tunnel..." The shredded fragments of books and magazines flew down the tunnel like leaves in a tornado, twisting and tumbling. The inside of the fabric was stiched with thousands of tiny cameras. The shreds were being photographed again and again, from every angle and orientation, till finally the torn leaves dropped into a bin just in front of Robert.