Japan is finally giving up on 1.44MB floppy disk drives, 50 years after they went on sale – but there’s no sign yet that Microsoft has removed the iconic ‘Save’ floppy icon from Office
Although floppy disks have long gone the way of the dodo, the ghost of the old recording media still haunts the digital world. Case in point: when you go to save a file in Microsoft Office, you notice that the save icon still appears as a floppy disk, even though chances are you’re saving your content to cloud storage instead of a slow, clunky plastic square with extremely limited storage capacity.
Japan is known as a technology leader, but the country’s government is still somewhat dependent on floppy disks.
As reported by Tom’s hardwareUntil last week, there were approximately 1,900 official government application procedures that required companies to submit diskettes or CD-ROMs (specific) with additional data. But ultimately, Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) wants to put this outdated practice behind it.
Updating the rules
METI has issued a “Ministerial Regulation Amending Certain METI Regulations to Promote Regulatory Reforms to Promote a Digital Society,” which aims to revise and update rules dictating the use of outdated media such as floppy disks. According to PC watchthis initiative is part of a broader review of analogue regulations (digital principles) at various ministries, led by the Digital Agency.
Current law not only mandates the use of outdated recording media, but also leaves ambiguity over whether cloud-based actions – such as creating and storing documents online – are allowed at all.
It’s amazing that it took so long for the Japanese government to take action, but METI has finally taken action. In an effort to modernize the regulations, all references to specific media types such as ‘floppy disk’ or ‘CD-ROM’ will be eliminated and replaced with more contemporary terms, such as ‘electromagnetic recording media’.
This move follows a series of initiatives in Japan aimed at reducing dependence on outdated technology, but is proving to be quite a challenge. For example, the fax machine is still widely used in the land of the rising sun. A May 2022 survey found that 54% of companies were still using this outdated way of communicating.