Global Music Vault teams up with Microsoft for long-term archival storage of music using glass

Global Music Vault have announced a partnership with Microsoft to use glass technology to help with the long-term archival storage of music. “As we want to offer the global music ecosystem an eternal solution, we believe that Microsoft’s Silica is that exact solution for our storage needs,” said Luke Jenkinson, Managing Director of Global Music Vault.

So, what exactly is the Global Music Vault? As we reported last year, it is an idea born from Norwegian company Elire Management Group who came up with the idea of storing the world’s best music – thus making it perhaps the largest musical database, or certainly one of them at least – in a vault for 1,000 years. The digital masters of music span from early recordings from indigenous people up to the modern music of today, also acting as a musical history. In far north Norway on the Svalbard archipelago between mainland Norway and the North Pole is where the vault can be found, and makes use of technology that will keep these digital masters of the tracks safe and able to play, no matter how far technology may have adapted in 1,000 years from now when this time capsule will open.

Now, Global Music Vault have taken the next step in their technology, and have teamed up with Microsoft and Elire Group to make use of their revolutionary technology titled ‘Project Silica’. This project has become the “first-ever storage technology designed and built from the media up, specifically for the cloud”, and will allow Global Music Vault to take advantage of it using a Proof of Concept glass platter, in which these files will be stored onto. It is stated in the press release that Silica has a data lifetime of thousands of years, which is certainly important to the vault who aim to showcase today’s music to generations of people far into the future. With the vault being in such harsh weather conditions in the snowy mountains, this is no issue for Silica which has been designed to withstand brutal environments and conditions and be be tampered with (baked, boiled, flooded and much more) without corrupting.

It’s versatility, longevity and storage makes it a no-brainer for the Global Music Vault, which Luke Jenkinson states when he explains:

“With over 4 million music producers globally, and over 60,000 songs being released just on Spotify every day, today’s digital and physical data storage solutions are quickly becoming outdated, irrelevant and a risk to our future. We not only want to put this high on the global music industry agenda, we want to work with the best companies in the world to find solutions. As we want to offer the global music ecosystem an eternal solution, we believe that Microsoft’s Silica is that exact solution for our storage needs”

To keep up to date with this project, visit the Global Music Vault website here to learn more.

Featured image credit: Daniel Kivle / provided by Elire Group and the Global Music Vault PR