If you only need to store a small amount of text I sell a product that can theoretically hold data for over 200 years on ferroelectric RAM. Ideally you would store the data on several different mediums in different locations but this device may be something you'd want in that mix.
I'm working on building computers designed to last longer than 50 years. They are primarily for the sort of timeless applications mentioned in the article. It's hard to imagine what people will be doing 50 years in the future, but it's not so difficult to see what people were doing 50 years ago that they're still doing today.
Transferring data off the computers won't be a problem in the future, if people are still interested there will be adapters and interface modules available, or you can make your own because of the open-source hardware, software and documentation. The software won't need to be updated because it won't need to run the latest version of everything.
There will be some advantages to using simpler and less capable computers for certain tasks, but most people will still need a modern computer for doing things like paying taxes and viewing advertisements.
The RP2040 is probably overkill for many projects but the pricing makes it very attractive for almost everything except where power and size are a huge factor. Many less capable MCUs are more than twice as expensive.
It can also replace an FPGA in certain cases where you need handle low latency I/O by using RP2040's Programmable IO [0]. (Not that it's the only microcontroller with this of kind abilities, there are others.)
The PIO is absolutely awesome, it's 100% the killer app for RP2040. Coupled with a second core to babysit PIO if needed, it actually competes with $15 microcontrollers in I/O heavy workloads (which is a huge proportion of all microcontroller workloads).
Tilt is a platform for developers that enables you to easily accept cryptocurrencies from your website or app while retaining control of your private keys. Tilt avoids the _"Not Your Keys, Not Your Coins"_ problem by ensuring that only you have access to the private keys.
This project is just going public today and is still very experimental. If anyone is interested in trying it out, it would be great to get some feedback.
I quite like this! Payment processors obviously need to take a cut, so they can't send the funds directly to your wallet, but having an alternative might be good.
Right, instead of taking a cut of the transactions, we hope to offer a valuable service by providing software and infrastructure that make it much easier to develop crypto payment solutions.
Just in case anyone wants to build one, you may find this useful. I made a 3D model that uses a small DC toy motor. I never got around to the software so I don't know if it will actually work.
Location: Downtown Los Angeles
Remote: Yes; text-only
Willing to relocate: No
Technologies: *
Résumé/CV: http://lonedynamics.com/lalone.pdf
Email: philip@lalone.org
https://machdyne.com/product/stahl-secure-storage-device/