Slane Masda
Leading Member
Its an answer that's repeatedly offered but it's weak. Backward compatibility is an ideal more than a reality once you span more than a couple of releases of a rapidly-changing O/S. Re-loading and using old software is usually a major grind if it works at all.
Reality check number two: few photographers will ever do a mass conversion of raw files to some other (probably proprietary) format. It's likely not practical due to the effort required, nor is it likely to be useful (see below). Update your storage media? Of course, regardless of the file formats you use.
Reality check number three: this implies that the photographer will re-process from .crw to some new format, and discard his/her tiffs, simply because .crw contains "more information". This is a technically correct definition of information, but its real-world relevance is limited. The additional information needs to be useful, not just present, to make re-processing worthwhile. If the processed tiff is commercial quality to begin with re-extraction will rarely be useful.
At the most this would justify saving raw files for a few exceptional images which might in future warrant re-processing from scratch to extract newly-visible information not contained in the (presumably outmoded) tiff. Ansel Adams might have had a couple of those, but I doubt I ever will.
So the actual bottom line is, most of us will rarely or never return to raw files in favor of our already extensively-processed tiffs. Conclusion? process your tiffs carefully, archive them carefully, and if you keep your raw files at all, do so for paranoia purposes only.
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Slane