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We are lucky that we have the Internet Archive to capture and serve content for the public and give us access to some of these old sites that have gone dark. I
by dvaun 6y ago
We are lucky that we have the Internet Archive to capture and serve content for the public and give us access to some of these old sites that have gone dark. I wish that I had done these things with some of the private forums that I belonged to as a kid. Many important articles and conversations are gone now that I didn't care to think to save them at those times.
It is nice to see that old monikers of mine aren't indexed and easy to find, and yet it's also sad because I realize that much of that content I perceive as reflections of my younger self and thoughts which I know I cannot imagine again today. When I recall those memories I only recall my perception of events: words that were said; actions taken by others; the consequences of my actions. Yet, I can't repeat those exact thoughts because my identity has changed since then.
I identify with the Zillenial[0] term. I also grew up on Linux and Windows due to my dad's interests. That is one of the acts that I am so grateful of my dad for, because it led me to where I am today.
For me, the web has been an important pillar of my life as it's given me so many sources of information that have granted me knowledge, given opportunities to read deep thoughts and niche content, and improved my principles and views on life. I'm sure many people on HN can relate to that statement, young and old alike.
[0]: https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Zillenial https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Zillenial
- dhosek 6y agoInterestingly, my very first internet post is still available. https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/net.micro/Gx803-rVnDI/PaVOwxBqAFQJ https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/net.micro/Gx803-rVnDI/... The funny part was that it was nostalgia about a defunct computing platform.
- Santosh83 6y agoIncidentally we may not have the Internet Archive in the future, depending on how the lawsuits brought on it by several publishers for copyright infringement goes. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23691297 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23691297
- dcow 6y agoI know exactly the sentiment. I think part of it was that growing up I truly believed the content I put on the internet would stick around. I didn't understand why things needed to be archived for posterity—the sites that were seemed to deserve such a fate anyway. I remember having so many interesting and free thinking discussions with members of various forums (computer repair, graphics editing tutorials, shurtugal to name a few genres). I honestly thought facebook would be the same, but with more familiar faces to names. Oh how I was wrong. Alas, Facebook was new web.
- dvaun 6y ago> I think part of it was that growing up I truly believed the content I put on the internet would stick around. I didn't understand why things needed to be archived for posterity—the sites that were seemed to deserve such a fate anyway. Maybe this is where a lot of us fall short. Free and easily available content is easy to take for granted since there is an abundance of it, like the discussions here on HN. So we ignore capturing it with an underlying assumption that it will be available again in the future. Perhaps it's like the Bystander effect[0]? [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bystander_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bystander_effect