Ron:
I worked in Hewlett-Packard's CD and DVD division developing technical manuals and training. I tested HP's first CD writer in 1995 and the CDs that I burned then (11 years ago) still work fine. A lot of the rumors about the longevity of the media are just that rumors. I am not saying they will last forever and I do recommend using high quality media (not the cheapies in Office Max or Staples).
I have also had some new discs that were defective, so to be same you should always make more than one copy. I burn two DVDs of my digital photos and scanned images and also have the files on a high capacity external hard drive. So my stuff exists in four places...just to be safe.