Getty, Corbis, National Geographic, ASMP, ASPP... Everyone Loves Adobe´s New .DNG Format

Adobe announced yesterday at the Photokina a new file format (DNG, Digital NeGative Specification) and

"hopes that the new [single file] format will solve the problem of multiple formats and multiple software packages by introducing a single format that can store information from a diverse range of cameras.
Adobe, who will be offering The Digital Negative Specification free of any legal restrictions or royalties, hopes that in doing so integration of the .DNG file format into digital cameras, printers, and software products will become widespread.
Where it sees the strength of the new file format is in a set of metadata that must be included in the file to describe key details about the camera and settings.
Of course the .DNG format is immediately supported in Adobe Photoshop CS as part of an updated Camera Raw Plug-in, as well as Adobe Photoshop Elements 3.0" (Pocket-lint.co.uk: "Adobe tries to unify digital camera market with new file standard").

Link to the Press Release and the Adobe DNG website with the freely available Adobe DNG Converter:

Raw file formats are becoming extremely popular in digital photography workflows because they offer creative professionals greater creative control. However, cameras can use many different raw formats — the specifications for which are not publicly available — which means that not every raw file can be read by a variety of software applications. As a result, the use of these proprietary raw files as a long-term archival solution carries risk, and sharing these files across complex workflows is even more challenging.
The solution to this growing problem? The Digital Negative (DNG), a new, publicly available archival format for the raw files generated by digital cameras. By addressing the lack of an open standard for the raw files created by individual camera models, DNG helps ensure that photographers will be able to access their files in the future. (Link)

Link to the complete pdf-file "Introducing the Digital Negative specification".

Comments from Getty, Corbis, National Geographic Magazine, American Society of Media Photographers, American Society of Picture Professionals and other people here in the Adobe Press Release.

First more technical oriented review here: "Are Raw Files Forever?":

The cumulative effect of numerous manufacturers producing dozens of new cameras a year, each one of which has a slightly different raw format, has lead us to the point where there are now a huge number of different raw formats. This places a burden on photographers, as well as a concern about the accessibility of these images in the future. It is easy to imagine a day when a photographer turns to his or her raw files taken ten or twenty years previous, and finds that they are unreadable. This has nothing to do with physical media, but simply whether or not the files can be read by then available software that can interpret them. (Michael Reichmann/Luminous Landscape)