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Ask HN: Best way to host a website for 500 years?

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Re: Ask HN: Best way to host a website for 500 years?

#741

Post by bombcar »

kiba wrote: post #715
mlinsey wrote: post #330

Other comments have given ways to physically archive the webpage. Continually hosting it is a much trickier endeavor. Beyond just keeping the servers up, technologies will shift such that eventually html webpages, servers that talk using tcp/ip, datacenters that connect via fiber cables, etc will all be deprecated. That said, if we have a very liberal definition of the word "website" to include any successor technolo…

The basic underlying technology didn't change that much. HTML is still HTML. Ditto for TCP/IP. These are going to work long after other elements of technology change. The newest tech are going to change more often than the foundation.

Parsers can still handle the original HTML spec but that may change - especially as security flaws are found. Something like TeX may last somewhat longer.

Re: Ask HN: Best way to host a website for 500 years?

#742

Post by KronisLV »

kingcharles wrote: post #314

Who is going to pay for your domain name? I was in jail and luckily had someone pay for one of my domains, but all the others I owned got recycled because I couldn't get to the Internet to pay for them. How many years in advance can you pay? What does ICANN support? 10 years? "maximum remaining unexpired term shall not exceed ten years" https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/faqs-84-2012-02-25-en#...

Would it be possible to automate payments for something like that? Just a few linked accounts that have money in them, that couldn't/wouldn't be seized for one reason or another?

Or just pay someone to do it in your name, like a small foundation.

Re: Ask HN: Best way to host a website for 500 years?

#743

Post by freosam »

rsj_hn wrote: post #389
markstos wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The United States government studied this question and came to the conclusion of... acid free paper. So it's now law that "permanent" documents in the US are to be stored on acid free paper: https://www.loc.gov/preservation/resources/rt/perm/permpapr.... Some of us who remember the 5.25" floppy disks, the 3" "floppy" disks, the HUGE Zipdisks, the 5.25" spinning platter drives, the 2.5" spinning platter drives, then t…

Acid free paper is a big improvement, but it's not gonna last 500 years. It's expected to last 200 years. Archival acid-free paper -- paper with cotton added to it -- can last up to 1000 years, but be prepared to pay $2.50 for 1 page[1], so a 400 page book will cost you $1000 for one copy, just for the paper in the book. This type of archival paper might be useful for important contracts or deeds, or legal documents.…

> This boils down the difference between pigment and dye based inks. Dye based inks are more expensive but more resistant to UV light.

I think it might be the other way around: pigment-based inks are opaque particles bonded to the paper, and so even if their colour changes/fades they're likely to still be legible. Whereas dye-based inks, when they fade, can completely disappear. (One advantage of dye-based inks is that they have a larger gamut.)

Re: Ask HN: Best way to host a website for 500 years?

#746

Post by acd »

3d Print the website in stone. Ie by water cutting, laser etching or sintering. Dig said stone under ground for future archegolist to dig up. Alternative put stone in a place it wont get disturbed/destroyed.

Why? Reading text printed in stone last long and has worked numerous times in past history. Examples Roman engravings, viking stones etc.

Flint stone tech

Re: Ask HN: Best way to host a website for 500 years?

#747

Post by shusaku »

999900000999 wrote: post #145

I would probably create some type of small self-contained unit, that's battery powered, and can recharge itself via solar panels. I'd have this device periodically try to fetch data from the internet. Once the internet goes down it goes down, and you'd have the local cached copy. I'd also have this mystical device print out the entire website in paper form every year or so, and then it would automatically shove the b…

I wish there was more discussion of pure tech solutions like this. If you could build a small satellite that broadcasts a radio signal with your website’s content, and stick it in space, maybe it would last. The question is does the tech exist yet ti keep something like that running, and if not can we get there any time soon!

Re: Ask HN: Best way to host a website for 500 years?

#750

Post by theK »

ironmagma wrote: post #386
pc86 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait so I shouldn't be spending all this time learning vi?

I guess there’s always the chance that society is collapsing because not enough people are trained with software to fix whatever the problem is.

Yes, the idiocracy scenario does appear more and more relevant when you go out and look around and realize that 99.9% of civilization treats tech just as black box appliances....
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