Do you know the URL address of this new Internet archive? Pier Carlo
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes " (Marcel Proust) ----- Original Message ----- From: "Subcommander Bob" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Thursday, October 25, 2001 11:45 AM Subject: web.archive.org Internet archive to open ---google + archeology > > Hey Mitch --Another part of your permenant record > > http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-102501archive.story > By JOSEPH MENN, Times Staff Writer > > SAN FRANCISCO -- An Internet archive containing more text than any > library in history will open its digital doors today, giving researchers > and the public access to just about everything posted on the World Wide > Web over the last five years. > > The free archive, created by a San Francisco computer entrepreneur named > Brewster Kahle, allows academics to conduct the electronic equivalent of > archeological digs, rooting through reams of material illustrating the > evolution of the Web and its role in American society. > > The Internet Archive, informally called the Wayback Machine, holds more > than 10 billion Web pages dating to 1996, including millions that had > vanished as dot-coms collapsed, big companies scaled back or updated > their offerings, and hobbyist Webmasters lost interest. > > Researchers and academics have likened Kahle to a modern-day Andrew > Carnegie, the steel baron who endowed many of the nation's finest > libraries. > > "Libraries are dedicated to collecting and making available the > permanent historical record," said Diane Kresh, the Library of Congress' > director for public service collections. She said trolling the Net is as > significant as gathering books or periodicals. > > Want to see what the Heaven's Gate cult page looked like before the > group's mass suicide? There it is. Want to see how Yahoo's pages have > changed since 1996? Step this way. Pages published by everyone from > Fortune 500 companies to renegade porn merchants are stashed in the > Internet Archive. > > The five-year, multimillion-dollar project has amassed five times as > much text as the Library of Congress, which helped fund the archive > along with Compaq Computer Corp., the National Science Foundation and > the Smithsonian Institution. The more-than 100 terabytes of data are > housed on 300 modified Hewlett-Packard desktop computers in a basement > at San Francisco's Presidio. > > The effort to record Internet history has been directed and largely > financed by Kahle, a 41-year-old former supercomputer technologist who > sold one Web firm to America Online and another to Amazon.com. > > "The opportunity of our time is to offer universal access to all of > human knowledge," Kahle said Wednesday from his office in the Presidio, > a decommissioned military base near the Golden Gate Bridge. "We're at a > unique point in time to offer universal access to anyone who walks into > a library in Uganda." > > The Internet Archive uses automated "bots" to scour the Web. They > capture sites and return what they find to the computers at the > Presidio. The archive updates every two months. Once captured, the sites > are organized chronologically. Users type in a Web address, and the > archive displays versions of that site since 1996. > > Sites that require passwords or block bots are not captured. And if > someone objects to their site being copied, the archive removes it. > > As smaller, less accessible versions of the archive were being compiled, > Kahle's 30 staffers got a few complaints. After the staff explained that > it wasn't personal, that they were copying everyone's sites, the vast > majority decided they didn't mind, Kahle said. > > "Most people say, 'You're crazy, but go for it,' " Kahle said. "People > want to be part of history." > > Candidates to use the service, at web.archive.org, include academics, > journalists and researchers. > > "It will allow researchers to study the evolution of the Web in a way > that is unprecedented," said research scientist Ed Chi of the Xerox Palo > Alto Research Center. He said Xerox PARC scientists already are working > on new user interfaces based on what the archive showed them about how > people looked for information. > > Early on, "we suspect people will go look for their own pages and see if > they can get copies of things that they've lost," Kahle said. "We're not > exactly sure how this is going to be used. We're looking forward to > being surprised." > > Like many Internet pioneers, however, Kahle faces unfamiliar risks along > with the opportunities. The Internet Archive may be a massive violation > of copyright law. > > "Brewster is taking an extraordinarily personal risk, because this is > potentially a criminal offense," said Lawrence Lessig, an expert on > intellectual property in cyberspace at Stanford University. > > Kahle doesn't anticipate getting sued, let alone serving jail time. His > plan is to post whatever he can--and keep the archive growing. > > "We're not here to test laws," Kahle said. "We're trying to build a > world we want to live in. The world without a library is a world without > a memory, and that would be tragic." > > The legal questions may take years to resolve, Kahle and Lessig said. > > Consider the Industry Standard. At least some of that defunct magazine's > articles are back online through Kahle's archive. But shareholder IDG > paid more than $1 million for the Standard's assets, including rights to > those stories. An IDG spokeswoman declined to say whether the company > would ask the archive to drop the articles. > > Kahle said he isn't worrying about the hypotheticals. He's more excited > about finding early www.whitehouse.gov pages from 1996 that dealt with > airport safety and bioterrorism. > > Even better is what's to come. > > "The woman who is going to be elected president in 2024 is in high > school now, and I bet she has a home page," Kahle said. "We have the > future president's home page!"