week 1: muddy point (comment, really)

After looking at the graph showing the drop in storage costs for digital materials, I'm wondering how the "life" of digital materials compares to that of paper and film. In the past microfilming craze people discovered that microfilm is not a permanent medium and deteriorated badly, and of course poorly archived paper crumbles too. Are there any statistics comparing the life of a digital item and the life of a paper/film saved item?