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We have decided to discontinue the process of allowing new customers to sign up for GeoCities accounts as we focus on helping our customers explore and build new relationships online in other ways. We will be closing GeoCities later this year.
Hmm. I wonder if Google would introduce "virtual backlinks" into the equation... continuing to credit a site with incoming links they used to have but which no longer exist.
you could say that about old people
Well, there was a song a few years ago that went "Kill all the old people and put them in a pot." (It didn't mention anything about GeoCities, but "Kill GeoCities and put it a pot" isn't quite as alliterative.)
Archive the ads too, if possible
In the future period dramas are going to have to ensure that when a computer screen is in shot that the appearance of the internet is correct. Maybe I should have kept quiet and started building up an archive of screen shots.
"Look, grandpa was synching his iPod at 5:49 PM on May 14, 2009!"
"Cool! What's an iPod?"
"It was a little handheld gadget that had to be connected to one of those ancient computers. Back then computers were the size of a small MMS (short for multimedia screen, basically a portable touch-screen capable of accessing every type of media on the net). Ironically, today's computers are the size of those old iPods and 1000 times more powerful, hehehe. I learned that in my history class. Anyways, people carried these little things around before the invention of the earPod, which are now surgically implanted into every newborn."
:)
More and more people are using the Internet as a pseudo-journal. Imagine your great-grandchildren looking at your Twitter page 50 years from now --
I think Geocities' closure just emphasises that the internet is more like a phone call than a magazine or book. It's ephemeral.
the internet is more like a phone call than a magazine or book. It's ephemeral.
More like a town-hall message board. It's not real-time, but not necessarily persistant either.
Which would Mr. Yang like to own today: Geocities or Volvo?
Which would Mr. Yang like to own today: Geocities or Volvo?
Probably could have bought Saab... Oh wait, GM already did, and now is ending the brand...
Hind sight is 20-20. I suspect there was a time when Geocities was a money maker with all the intrusive ads. That was before Google figured out how to put intrusive ads on virtually every Internet property out there ;)
"Cool! What's an iPod?"
I know that some WebmasterWorld members will regard this as copyright infringement, but IMO it is an important part of history and should be preserved.
[edited by: lawman at 1:01 am (utc) on May 4, 2009]
Because we�re talking literally millions of files with an average size of 1 to 30 kilobytes, it becomes harder and harder to get a �big picture� view of everything we�ve grabbed, but after 48 hours of work, Archive Team has saved over 200,000 Geocities sites. We�re now pulling in new sites at the rate of something like 5 a second. Is that fast enough? We�ll see, won�t we.
The wolves come to feed on the carrion...and some of that carrion MIGHT have been mine (I already moved that stuff off years ago but that's beside the point). I just got bad news of the "Big C" and at some fairly close future date I, too, will be gone. When that happens I want my stuff to pass with me...or pass to those I give it to. This mad rush to save the dead guys Geocities work (and all the live guys/gals, too!) is bogus; and is nothing more than a rape of Geocities content by the "preservers", particularly if they make it public again. If saved in silence (ie. not placed on the web again under new management) I won't squirm...after all we can all make a "copy" of any website for private use.
So yes, there is a possible infringement of copyright in progress.
I never seem to express my point very well in these debates, I really am not trying to say that you can use the "saving it for history" argument to override the express will of the copyright holder.
But I don't think the vast majority of GeoCities sites fall into that category, and I'm glad someone is trying to save them despite the legal situation. And I do mean save, I certainly wouldn't support someone sticking them up online and serving ads alongside them.
GeoCities is a special case, as other posters have pointed out, due to its place in the history of the web. But with enough distance even today's MySpace might be interesting to someone in the future. See this graffiti from Pompeii [pompeiana.org]. (somewhat NSFW, but very historical!)
And like tangor, I wouldn't want my content republished without my permission. I'd do it myself if I wanted to.
The wolves come to feed on the carrion...and some of that carrion MIGHT have been mine (I already moved that stuff off years ago but that's beside the point). I just got bad news of the "Big C" and at some fairly close future date I, too, will be gone. When that happens I want my stuff to pass with me...or pass to those I give it to. This mad rush to save the dead guys Geocities work (and all the live guys/gals, too!) is bogus; and is nothing more than a rape of Geocities content by the "preservers", particularly if they make it public again. If saved in silence (ie. not placed on the web again under new management) I won't squirm...after all we can all make a "copy" of any website for private use.So yes, there is a possible infringement of copyright in progress.
tangor,
More than likely, the GeoCities TOS/UAG allows Geo to do whatever they desire with the content of pages. Users agreed to compliance/acceptance even if they never took the time to read the TOS/UAG, simply by adding their materials.
A similar TOS/UAG exists at many of the Yahoo provided forums. (Ex: Yahoo Groups)
Where could/would the Geocities folks migrate to? I'm all for that, but the question remains... where?
