Examples of Obsolete File Formats?

reedk writes "I was having a discussion with my boss about long-term archives, and we got on the topic of older files becoming un-readable by newer versions of software. Not only are those old Ami pro files unreadable by today's common word processors, but I have heard that newer version of Office can't consistently open very old versions of Office documents. With the increasing retention periods being forced by current and coming regulations, this could become a problem of compliance in the future. We want to pursue this topic, but to build support for it internally, I am looking for examples of older file formats that are no longer readable by newer version of the same software or due to the market death of the product. If true, this would lend a lot of force behind moving to products that have an open file format. Can Slashdot readers come up with examples of this, or ways they have had to get around these kinds of problems?"

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:simple

[DJCater]

Yeah, spelling and grammer...

Well duh...

[DJCater]

XML! Open-source! Standards-compliant! Rag-doll physics! (Oh wait, wrong buzzword-bank...)

Obsolete files from Kazaa

[Anonymous Coward]

I keep double clicking on these ".mpg.avi.jpg.Donkey Bukkake Porn.wmv.exe" files and nothing happens!

Maybe I should start using Windows?

I have a lot of GeoWrite documents...

[Richard Steiner]

...with embedded images and such that were created by Geoworks Ensemble back in the early 1990's, and converting them to another format has proven to be a bit of a pain due to the lack of good export filters in GeoWrite or its successors, and also due to the fact that nobody else seems to be able to read GeoWrite files.

Thankfully, I can still get the PC/GEOS environment to work on various PCs at home, but at some point that won't be an option.