5 ms·

GeoCities Japan is shutting down

103 points by prostoalex 8y ago

emodendroket 8y ago
When I was in Japan Yahoo Search was still the big thing, as alluded to in the article. It seems like their lack of presence on smartphones might have been the beginning of the end for them.
- lev99 8y ago
  Yahoo Auction Japan (https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/ https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/) is still very active as well.
  - xrd 8y ago
    Maybe eBay saw the writing on the wall there and that's why they bought qoo10.jp.
dumbfounder 8y ago
How much data is it? Is it really that hard to just keep it available in read-only? Seems like the ads they could serve would justify its existence.
- criddell 8y ago
  Assuming they have thought of those options, perhaps that tells you how little value there is there.
  - C4K3 8y ago
    Yahoo! is known for being overzealous in deleting old content. https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=Yahoo https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=Yahoo!
  - pmlnr 8y ago
    "value" Today the only measure of "value" is the money it brings. Imagine of museums, archeology, libraries, archivist would only be thinking along those lines as well. Geocities had a lot of value, and, unlike physical bookshelves, it would have been very simple to keep it going as static, read-only sites. Same applies here. Related: https://medium.com/message/never-trust-a-corporation-to-do-a-librarys-job-f58db4673351 https://medium.com/message/never-trust-a-corporation-to-do-a...
    - criddell 8y ago
      > Imagine of museums, archeology, libraries, archivist would only be thinking along those lines as well. You don't have to imagine. They make these kinds of decisions all the time. I'm not saying that it would have been difficult or expensive to keep it going as a static thing. Just that even a tiny cost is apparently too much. Maybe this announcement will encourage somebody that cares more about the data than GeoCities Japan to come along and buy it from them with the intention of preserving it.
      - moate 8y ago
        Seriously. Museums/archives throw out things ALL THE TIME because they can't afford to keep housing them.
        emodendroket 8y ago
        It is true that museums and libraries prune their collections. What's not true is that they make these determinations from the same profit motive that drives businesses.
- omoikane 8y ago
  There are probably other costs such as upgrading servers and responding to various legal requests. Legal compliance with respect to changing laws might be a reason why read-only content can not persist forever.
  - pmlnr 8y ago
    geocities-jpn.tar.gz.torrent ?
qwerty456127 8y ago
Fortunately, there is a number of static hosting providers that are better than the old generation nowadays (e.g. GitHub pages, Netlify, Aerobatic). I just hope the content archive is not going to be lost.
- icebraining 8y ago
  > I just hope the content archive is not going to be lost. https://twitter.com/textfiles/status/1046669423413669888 https://twitter.com/textfiles/status/1046669423413669888 (and you can (probably) help!)
LinuxBender 8y ago
Slightly off-topic, but I saw in another HN thread the other day that someone created an open source fork of GeoCities. NeoCities [1] and a GitHub repo [2] I hope it makes a come-back, animated gifs and all. [1] - https://neocities.org/ https://neocities.org/ [2] - https://github.com/neocities https://github.com/neocities
- theandrewbailey 8y ago
  Depends on your definition of "fork". Successor, maybe. Neocities has been around for at least 5 years: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5918724 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5918724
  - LinuxBender 8y ago
    Very good point. I should have said succeeded.
- mawxii 8y ago
  that site is father of one of the coolest websites ever: https://fauux.neocities.org/ https://fauux.neocities.org/
  - ian0 8y ago
    Ive never seen this site but it triggered a memory of browsing the web back in the day where each site was so obviously someones with a unique character evident.
- gnooby 8y ago
  there is also a search engine called http://wiby.me http://wiby.me that has a lot of web 1.0 sites, which someone had discussed here before
gourneau 8y ago
https://www.cameronsworld.net/ https://www.cameronsworld.net/ is a lovely tribute to the lost GeoCities pages (warning has sound).
daveslash 8y ago
"A decade ago, internet users who grew up with Web 1.0 bid a fond farewell to [Geocities]" <-- this is what really hit me. It was a decade ago that GeoCities shut down? I honestly would have estimated that to be no more than 5 years ago.
- coding123 8y ago
  Funny how perspectives work. I had a small Quake page on Geocities, and I know for sure I was in my teens, like 18, so like 20 years ago. So to hear it was ONLY 10 years ago is kinda shocking to me.
  - seppin 8y ago
    I would have guessed 20 years as well
carindistory 8y ago
Several years ago, Infoseek, one of the most popular - possibly more than GeoCities - web hosting services in Japan shut down and a huge amount of valuable content accumulated over decades has been lost forever. What makes matters worse, unlike when GeoCities in the US shut down, no one created an archive of the websites hosted on Infoseek before they went offline. Possibly because they are not interested in preserving cultural legacy. So I hope someone reading this news would create an archive of GeoCities Japan, as I cannot expect the Japanese to do it.
- kristofferR 8y ago
  You should notify ArchiveTeam about it: https://archiveteam.org https://archiveteam.org
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]

103 points by prostoalex 8y ago

When I was in Japan Yahoo Search was still the big thing, as alluded to in the article. It seems like their lack of presence on smartphones might have been the beginning of the end for them.

lev99 8y ago
Yahoo Auction Japan (https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/ https://auctions.yahoo.co.jp/) is still very active as well.
- xrd 8y ago
  Maybe eBay saw the writing on the wall there and that's why they bought qoo10.jp.

dumbfounder 8y ago

How much data is it? Is it really that hard to just keep it available in read-only? Seems like the ads they could serve would justify its existence.

criddell 8y ago
Assuming they have thought of those options, perhaps that tells you how little value there is there.
- C4K3 8y ago
  Yahoo! is known for being overzealous in deleting old content. https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=Yahoo https://www.archiveteam.org/index.php?title=Yahoo!
- pmlnr 8y ago
  "value" Today the only measure of "value" is the money it brings. Imagine of museums, archeology, libraries, archivist would only be thinking along those lines as well. Geocities had a lot of value, and, unlike physical bookshelves, it would have been very simple to keep it going as static, read-only sites. Same applies here. Related: https://medium.com/message/never-trust-a-corporation-to-do-a-librarys-job-f58db4673351 https://medium.com/message/never-trust-a-corporation-to-do-a...
  - criddell 8y ago
    > Imagine of museums, archeology, libraries, archivist would only be thinking along those lines as well. You don't have to imagine. They make these kinds of decisions all the time. I'm not saying that it would have been difficult or expensive to keep it going as a static thing. Just that even a tiny cost is apparently too much. Maybe this announcement will encourage somebody that cares more about the data than GeoCities Japan to come along and buy it from them with the intention of preserving it.
    - moate 8y ago
      Seriously. Museums/archives throw out things ALL THE TIME because they can't afford to keep housing them.
      - emodendroket 8y ago
        It is true that museums and libraries prune their collections. What's not true is that they make these determinations from the same profit motive that drives businesses.
omoikane 8y ago
There are probably other costs such as upgrading servers and responding to various legal requests. Legal compliance with respect to changing laws might be a reason why read-only content can not persist forever.
- pmlnr 8y ago
  geocities-jpn.tar.gz.torrent ?

qwerty456127 8y ago

Fortunately, there is a number of static hosting providers that are better than the old generation nowadays (e.g. GitHub pages, Netlify, Aerobatic). I just hope the content archive is not going to be lost.

icebraining 8y ago
> I just hope the content archive is not going to be lost. https://twitter.com/textfiles/status/1046669423413669888 https://twitter.com/textfiles/status/1046669423413669888 (and you can (probably) help!)

LinuxBender 8y ago

Slightly off-topic, but I saw in another HN thread the other day that someone created an open source fork of GeoCities. NeoCities [1] and a GitHub repo [2] I hope it makes a come-back, animated gifs and all. [1] - https://neocities.org/ https://neocities.org/ [2] - https://github.com/neocities https://github.com/neocities

theandrewbailey 8y ago
Depends on your definition of "fork". Successor, maybe. Neocities has been around for at least 5 years: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5918724 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5918724
- LinuxBender 8y ago
  Very good point. I should have said succeeded.
mawxii 8y ago
that site is father of one of the coolest websites ever: https://fauux.neocities.org/ https://fauux.neocities.org/
- ian0 8y ago
  Ive never seen this site but it triggered a memory of browsing the web back in the day where each site was so obviously someones with a unique character evident.
gnooby 8y ago
there is also a search engine called http://wiby.me http://wiby.me that has a lot of web 1.0 sites, which someone had discussed here before

gourneau 8y ago

https://www.cameronsworld.net/ https://www.cameronsworld.net/ is a lovely tribute to the lost GeoCities pages (warning has sound).

daveslash 8y ago

"A decade ago, internet users who grew up with Web 1.0 bid a fond farewell to [Geocities]" <-- this is what really hit me. It was a decade ago that GeoCities shut down? I honestly would have estimated that to be no more than 5 years ago.

coding123 8y ago
Funny how perspectives work. I had a small Quake page on Geocities, and I know for sure I was in my teens, like 18, so like 20 years ago. So to hear it was ONLY 10 years ago is kinda shocking to me.
- seppin 8y ago
  I would have guessed 20 years as well

carindistory 8y ago

Several years ago, Infoseek, one of the most popular - possibly more than GeoCities - web hosting services in Japan shut down and a huge amount of valuable content accumulated over decades has been lost forever. What makes matters worse, unlike when GeoCities in the US shut down, no one created an archive of the websites hosted on Infoseek before they went offline. Possibly because they are not interested in preserving cultural legacy. So I hope someone reading this news would create an archive of GeoCities Japan, as I cannot expect the Japanese to do it.

kristofferR 8y ago
You should notify ArchiveTeam about it: https://archiveteam.org https://archiveteam.org
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]