The National Archives intends to preserve and extract electronic records free from dependence on any specific hardware or software, and the plan will require the availability of metadata, which is added data that describes the digital information and shows how to handle it. Kenneth Thidodeau, director of the National Archives Electronic Records Archives program, points out that, for instance, U.S. Navy ships have a life span of 50 years, and all ships operational records are in digital formats. Considerable effort will be required to encase the records in sufficient information to allow users to know what is there and what should be done with it, but simpler metadata can assist users in searching and retrieval of born-digital content information. Such metadata might include date and time stamp attached to data files, lens and shutter information in digital photo files, information in e-mail, and descriptive information. These methods do not force users to do extra tasks, and the content in text files becomes internal metadata that can be automatically indexed. Information is also highly changeable, but because storage is cheap, archivists often no longer have to decide what to throw away. Moreover, sensors of all types, including scientific, agricultural, mechanical, and those in digital camcorders can also quickly create huge collections of digital data. For instance, Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen's Brain Atlas project is mapping the activity of genes in brain cells. Automation is expected to assist in simplification of some facets of digital preservation. For example, on the BBN Technologies PodZinger Web site, speech-to-text software is used for indexing of podcasts and searching of their content.