The Backrooms of the Internet Archive • Hacker News Board

Re: The Backrooms of the Internet Archive

#111

Post by account42 » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 9:17 AM UTC

IndrekR wrote: post #98

zerocrates wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Cybershot is a point-and-shoot digital camera, not a phone. Though Android does still use the DCIM folder, that whole basic structure, for compatibility with things that are looking for photos on drives, SD cards, etc. I think Sony phones even still use the DSC filename prefix for their photos.

It seems there is actual standard behind it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_rule_for_Camera_File_sy...

Like many standards it's just formalized documentation of existing practice.

Re: The Backrooms of the Internet Archive

#112

Post by account42 » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 9:18 AM UTC

pfraze wrote: post #96

magic_hamster wrote: post #71

I was sort of expecting an article called "the backrooms of IA" to tell me some interesting things about the unseen parts of IA. But it's still cool to see where the backrooms image came from. Presumably the building is still around and the hobbytown store seems to be in business as well. Some videos I found of the store from 2014 mention it's the source of the "backrooms", so maybe this wasn't such a huge mystery to…

You can visit the Internet Archive in SF. It’s worth it. They use an old church

Not everyone is near SF so an online article would still be appreciated.

Re: The Backrooms of the Internet Archive

#113

Post by account42 » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 9:38 AM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #103

Waterluvian wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. But it can be about a lot of things. And almost the entirety of the game takes place in liminal spaces.

If we're going there, we may as well mention Portal which predates Stanley Parable by 6 years, and features liminal spaces with the same eerie feel - in the game, you wake up trapped in an abandoned laboratory that seems to go on forever, which on its own hits the liminal notes a bit, and then you suddenly find yourself breaking out into service corridors and navigating the backrooms of the facility. Portal 2 (two ye…

Portal and especially Portal 2 have a very different feel to them for me - too dilapidated to evoke the same feelings as the office maze in TSP. There is also that TSP goes for retro while Portal goes for retro-futuristic.

Re: The Backrooms of the Internet Archive

#114

Post by account42 » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 9:41 AM UTC

textfiles wrote: post #28

See you all in the backrooms

It wasn't needed this time but it would be great to have a fulltext (and binary!) and reverse image search of the internet archive. Often you know something about what you are searchng fore but have no clue about the location.

E.g. I'm interested of finding old installers of a particular type (identifyable by certain byte sequences) but they could have been hosted anywhere.

I guess this is not feasible with the current resources of the IA and if it did happen it would probably just result in them getting hammered with DMCA requests and other legal demands for content that the "owners" didn't even know was on the archive.

Re: The Backrooms of the Internet Archive

#115

Post by b112 » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 9:55 AM UTC

joenot443 wrote: post #88

b112 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems very unfair. There's absolutely no point, anywhere in that IA blog post, that says "We found it". Anywhere! They're just providing information on the history of the file, from their archives , and detail into why it's an amusing story. They even say Naturally, as news of the Backrooms being “found” travels throughout the world, responses have wildly ranged. For some, this is a proof that “with enough eyeba…

I think it’s usually pretty customary to attribute the original source if you’re going to write an exposition. They go through enough work explaining exactly the location of the furniture store, you’d think they’d have the courtesy to link to the tweet which actually made the discovery. As has been pointed out though, IA has a pretty tenuous relationship with the Musk/chan adjacent parts of the internet, so it doesn’…

You say that as if anyone knows.

From other comments in this thread, it looks like some guy on X solved it in 2018, yet others had no idea, and solved it independently too.

How many others "solved it"? Where is the official record of this? Who really was first? Did someone solve it before 2018? Did more than one party solve it, independently, recently?

Trying to untangle that and be sure, isn't simple.

They covered this by saying many eyeballs solved it, and then went on to their key message, highlighting the importance of archives, and showing how their archive proves the solution is correct.

My point is, pointing an accusatory finger at them, and saying they are trying to take credit is not fair.

Re: The Backrooms of the Internet Archive

#116

Post by celdon25 » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 11:06 AM UTC

chuckadams wrote: post #94

celdon25 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any evidence for this or just mentioning it because you can?

I try to not mention Xitter because I just want it to go away. It was terrible as a conversation format before, and it's completely unusable now. Oh yeah, the owner is a raging douchecanoe too. But mostly it's just broken.

That wasn’t the context of the question. We are well aware that there are randos out there who don’t like Elon. I was asking why the GP felt the need to share the assumption of the author’s reasons for not mentioning the source, despite having no evidence. You’ve managed to lower the bar even further in the conversation, however.

Re: The Backrooms of the Internet Archive

#117

Post by salad-tycoon » Tue, Jun 11, 2024, 2:52 PM UTC

celdon25 wrote: post #86

msephton wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's part of the recent trend to not mention Twitter/X because of its owner.

Any evidence for this or just mentioning it because you can?

dang changed a twitter link to non a twitter one in the past month or so because paraphrasing the twitter one may not work, let’s not prefer twitter, blah blah [nb original link worked fine].

Sorry I didn’t archive this but should be in the history.

That said I know many here have an involuntary eye spasm episode with Elon being mentioned but not sure IA does so not sure I agree with the original accusation.