“… research has now found that the vast majority of data stored in the cloud is “dark data”, meaning it is used once then never visited again. That means that all the memes and jokes and films that we love to share with friends and family – from “All your base are belong to us”, through Ryan Gosling saying “Hey Girl”, to Tim Walz with a piglet – are out there somewhere, sitting in a datacentre, using up energy…”
I agree, but the key point of the story isn’t IT in general as a growing problematic sector, it’s specifically storage. IT is a broad category that can include a lot of different technological modalities (ICT according to that study you linked), but whinging about memes stored somewhere forgotten is pretty low on the list of practical concerns.
Yes I agree that the headline and article is silly to reference memes and undermines the study as a whole which seems more sound.
I know loads of people of take hundred of photos a day and then pay a cloud hoster (or use a “free” service) to store it indefinitely and never look back at it again.
Cloud storage isn’t straight forwardly just hard storage because its kept in data centers such that it can be downloaded at any point.
Cloud storage is replacing any sense of needing a digital archivist processes for people and businesses because it much cheaper and easier to store it just in case the data is needed again rather than actually strategetically thinking about what data is important to keep and what isn’t.