“… research has now found that the vast majority of data stored in the cloud is “dark data”, meaning it is used once then never visited again. That means that all the memes and jokes and films that we love to share with friends and family – from “All your base are belong to us”, through Ryan Gosling saying “Hey Girl”, to Tim Walz with a piglet – are out there somewhere, sitting in a datacentre, using up energy…”
I mean, if it is forgotten, then it just takes hard drive space (plus extra if the drive is fragmented)…do you mean the fraction of energy used by the hard drive just by being on? Does it add up to anything comparable to actually spending processing cycles?
We used to have libraries to store media history and shitposting controversies like the Dreyfus affair…