February 19, 2026
Shards, snarks, and storage
Microsoft's new 10k-year data storage medium: glass
Microsoft wants your data in glass for 10,000 years—commenters roast, reminisce, and ask “Blu‑ray?”
TLDR: Microsoft demoed Project Silica: etching data into durable glass that could last millennia, though it’s not for sale yet. Commenters joked about Windows’ size, asked if Blu‑ray is still the DIY king, and debated whether this is game‑changing archival tech or just a cool lab demo.
Microsoft unveiled Project Silica, a demo that etches data into tough glass with ultra-fast lasers, aiming to last for millennia with no power when idle. The lab claim floating around the thread: up to 4.84TB per slab. Cool science, sure—but the comments immediately turned it into a roast and a referendum on practicality.
The hottest zinger? A user joked that 4.84TB “might just be enough” for a Windows with Copilot installer—cue a wave of Windows-bloat memes. Meanwhile, DIYers asked the real question: Is Blu‑ray still best for hobbyists? That spun into a split between “this is for hyperscale archives and museums” versus “wake me when I can back up my media shelf.” One commenter imagined sci-fi “5D crystals,” only to pivot into a burn: this looks more like “drawing on slabs like the Egyptians.” Translation: less neon future, more modern Rosetta Stone.
Amid the snark, the sober take surfaced: this isn’t consumer-ready yet, and it’s likely for cold storage—think libraries and studios—not your home NAS. The official explainer is in Microsoft’s blog post (link), with extra nerd sparring on Hacker News (link). Verdict from the crowd: impressive longevity, uncertain vibes—half “future of archives,” half “nice museum piece.”
Key Points
- •Microsoft Research presented Project Silica, a glass-based archival storage system, in Nature.
- •The prototype writes and reads data in glass slabs at densities over a megabyte per cubic millimeter.
- •Femtosecond lasers enable rapid, localized etching, improving write speeds and data density.
- •Data can be read by laser-based systems similar to optical discs or other feature-detection methods.
- •Two voxel-writing approaches were explored, including one using birefringence; hardware is not yet commercial-ready.