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Lost in cyberspace

Technology and society: Amid the explosive growth of digital content on the internet, little thought has been given to preserving things for posterity. Will historians of the future wish that web pages had been preserved more carefully?

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Jim Boulton

The web has changed the world. The publishing of the first web page in 1991 is a defining moment in our history, as significant as the publishing of the Gutenberg Bible in 1455. The lack of a record of the first five years of the web, pre Wayback Machine would be a tragedy in equal proportion to the loss of The Library of Alexandria.

Just because they’re recent history, doesn’t make early websites any less important than the first cave paintings, Muybridge’s first experiments with the moving image or the first works of literature created by the Sumerians in the 18th century BC.

Unless we act now, this recent artistic, commercial and social history will be lost. I would urge anyone who has the code for early websites sitting on old machines and redundant media to rescue it now while they still can.

I curate an exhibition that highlights this important issue, some information about which can be found at www.digital-archaeology.org. Other notable initiatives include:

www.webarchive.org.uk - The British Library
www.internetmemory.org - European Foundation
www.archivethe.net - Spin-off of above
www.digitalpreservation.gov - Library of Congress
www.rhizome.org - online archive of digital art

Paller

I think paper still has a future where longevity is concerned. The complexity of encoding and decoding electronic information coupled with continuous rapid change in software and hardware make it a nightmare where longevity is concerned. For example how do I read the contents of an article stored on a 5 1/4 inch floppy disk in the late 80s? Well I probably have to visit a computer museum. Next I have to try and locate the application that wrote the article in order to decode it. Compare that to blowing some dust off my great grandfather's diary. Finally how long will the floppy disk even hold it's various bits and bytes before they degrade and the information is lost forever. Again comparison with good quality ink and paper need to be considered.

ypaAaR5m4q

I read recently that even the computer tapes for the first space explorations are no longer accessible because the equipment used to create them has gone and the people who knew how to build them are long gone.

renbtg

I´ve read this very same article before, a few months ago. This is a reprint/repost, right?

glpittman

in an age of stupid patent lawsuits, we need to have access to prior examples of the raw materials that someone may have latched on to claim as their own original idea, so we can free ideas to the greater public good.

CSPariah

The article states: For its part The Economist has made available digital copies of every issue going back to the day it was launched in 1843.

How can one access this archive? I can only see print issues going back to 2000.

Amy Slowik

As a librarian and an information specialist, I am offended by your throwing off the statement "little thought has been given to recording information for posterity." What do you think that we as a profession are devoted to doing all day every day?! What do you think that archivists, particularly the growing field of digital archivists, DO for a living? I think you need to do some serious research on this topic.

www.technogabble.com

Carl_in_Madrid

Dear Sir,
Your characterization of the 1000 years of human history in western Europe from the collapse of the western Roman empire to the Italian Renaissance as "a millennium of misery ... with ignorance and poverty the rule" is a disappointing rehash of a 500 year old slander. To paraphrase a philosopher of the time, to demonstrate such ignorance in one aspect of one's argument is to leave the whole open to doubt. Disappointing.

Uni von Muri

... that is to say, neither AkashicRecords nor PlanetHardDrive, eh? ... at least thus far ...

Institute of Further and Farther Studies
@ the Uni von Muri

sandsun in reply to CSPariah

You can go as far back as you like (by changing the year value in the URL on the "Previous Issues" page), but there's nothing from before July 19th, 1997. Unless those issues are from a region that cannot be selected.

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