It’s back to good ol’ US of A where the DOGE axe/chainsaw keeps pushing through government agencies. This time around DOGE made waves by claiming it could "save” $1 million per year by converting 14,000 magnetic tapes, as old as 70 years, into permanent digital records. The announcement, done over X/Twitter, was characteristically bold, claiming the project as a hallmark of efficiency and modernization.
Source:
https://x.com/DOGE/status/1908261360565194834
That said a deeper dive into the claim reveals not only a reliance on a tried-and-tested, highly reliable storage medium but also suggests that updating an already robust system wasn’t about radical innovation. Instead, it appears to be more of a PR manoeuvrer, with little apparent concern for disrupting established systems in a meaningful way. Even the X/Twitter community notes have highlighted the caveats about the reliability of the claim.
In fact, from a technical standpoint, tape storage has long been celebrated for its unmatched cost efficiency and impressive longevity. Unlike modern storage solutions such as HDDs, SSDs, or even virtual tape libraries, built to which prioritize rapid, random data access, tape remains the gold standard for long-term archival, offering a remarkably low cost per terabyte and engineered to preserve data for decades. The longevity of tape archive has long been a feature critical for regulatory archives and historical records. The alternative, modern solutions, while faster, frequently come with significantly higher costs and wear issues requiring regular replacements. When the DOGE initiative proclaims the "modernization" of tape storage, it inadvertently underlines a tiny but very important truth. Despite all the evolution that storage systems have undergone over decades, tape has remained as the gold standard for archive has no paradigm-shifting alternatives have managed to match its durability and affordability.
If I were a cynic, I would say that the approach has been absolutely in keeping with their “mandate” to disrupt the “status quo”. The lack of concern with the potential disruption. The “chaos monkey” approach, reveals priorities that may be more pernicious than efficiency related. Perhaps there is a wider approach from the whole administration that does not prioritize the traditional record keeping that has been a pillar of government systems.
If there is something to learn from this is that we must all remember the lessons that older, more experienced, members of the IT community have passed on. You are only as good as your last restore.
I would say, tape and modern archive solutions in parallel might leverage benefits. Modern archive leverage faster search and processing, and Tape systems will keep their benefits with low usage (lesser wearing) With this approach I would say is ok, however removing tapes feels troublesome. In case of an event of „modern“ storage damage/issues, what they will gona do, hence tapes still can be used for recovery.