Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content • Hacker News Board

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#201

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:14 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #146

silicon2401 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But for my personal site, for example, I'd much rather you link to me directly rather than content in WayBackMachine. That would make sense if users were archiving your site for your benefit, but they're probably not. If I were to archive your site, it's because I want my own bookmarks/backups/etc to be more reliable than just a link, not because I'm looking out to preserve your website. Otherwise, I'm just gamblin…

It's a deep problem with the web as we know it. If I want to make a "scrapbook" to support a research project of some kind. Really I want to make a "pyramid" with a general overview that is at most a few pages at the top, then some documents that are more detailed, but with the original reference material incorporated and linked to what it supports. In 2020 much of that reference material will come from the web and y…

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Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#202

Post by ethanwillis » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:14 PM UTC

bartread wrote: post #170

ethanwillis wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a strawman because I never said they should be. There's room for better alternatives. We as a community need to think bigger rather than resigning ourselves to our fate.

It's not a strawman because (a) I agreed with you, (b) context, and (c) I asked a question based on what you seemed to be implying in that context: a question to which you still haven't provided an answer. Let me put it another way: what specifically are you suggesting as an alternative?

If I had to pick a solution from what's available right now technology wise I'd pick something that links based on content hashes. And then pulls the content from decentralized hosting.

I don't think I like IPFS as an organization, but tech wise it's probably what I'd go with.

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#203

Post by samatman » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:15 PM UTC

This is such a fundamental problem that I'd like to be able to solve it at the HTML level.

An anchor type which allows several URLs, to be tried in order, would go a long way. Then we could add automatic archiving and backup links to a CMS.

It isn't real content-centric networking, which is a pity, but it's achievable with what we have.

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#204

Post by Arkanosis » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:17 PM UTC

markjgraham wrote: post #197

We suggest/encourage people link to original URLs but ALSO (as opposed to instead of) provide Wayback Machine URLs so that if/when the original URLs go bad (link rot) the archive URL is available, or to give people a way to compare the content associated with a given URL over time (content drift) BTW, we archive all outlinks from all Wikipedia articles from all Wikipedia sites, in near-real-time... so that we are abl…

This is so much better than INSTEAD.

Not for the sole reason that it leaves some control to the content owner while ultimately leaving the choice to the user, but also because things like updates and erratums (eg. retracted papers) can't be found in archives. When you have both, it's the best of both world: you have the original version, the updated version, and you can somehow have the diff between them. IMHO, this is especially relevant in when the purpose is reference.

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#205

Post by jhallenworld » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:22 PM UTC

markjgraham wrote: post #197

We suggest/encourage people link to original URLs but ALSO (as opposed to instead of) provide Wayback Machine URLs so that if/when the original URLs go bad (link rot) the archive URL is available, or to give people a way to compare the content associated with a given URL over time (content drift) BTW, we archive all outlinks from all Wikipedia articles from all Wikipedia sites, in near-real-time... so that we are abl…

It's interesting to think about how HTML could be modified to fix the issue. Initial thought: along with HREF, provide AREF- a list of archive links. The browser could automatically try a backup if the main one fails. The user should be able to right-click the link to select a specific backup. Another idea is to allow the web-page author to provide a rewrite rule to automatically generate wayback machine (or whatever) links from the original. This seems less error prone and browsers could provide a default that authors could override.

Anyway, the fix should work even with plain HTML. I'm sure there are a bunch of corner cases and security issues involved..

Well as mentioned by others, there is a browser extension. It's interesting to read the issues people have with it:

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/wayback-machi...

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#206

Post by krapp » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:23 PM UTC

Apropos of nothing but I added the ability to archive links in Anarki a few months back[0]. If dang or someone wants to take it for HN they're welcome to. Excuse the crappy quality of my code and pr format, though.

It might be useful as a backup if the original site starts getting hugged to death.

[0]https://github.com/arclanguage/anarki/pull/179

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#207

Post by zwayhowder » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:55 PM UTC

bartread wrote: post #21

I'm not sure I'm a fan of this because it just turns WayBackMachine into another content silo. It's called the world wide web for a reason, and this isn't helping. I can see it for corporate sites where they change content, remove pages, and break links without a moment's consideration. But for my personal site, for example, I'd much rather you link to me directly rather than content in WayBackMachine. Apart from any…

Not to forget that while I might go to an article written ten years ago, the Wayback archive won't show me a related article that you published two years ago updating the article information or correcting a mistake.

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#208

Post by devenblake » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 7:59 PM UTC

jhallenworld wrote: post #205

markjgraham wrote: post #197

We suggest/encourage people link to original URLs but ALSO (as opposed to instead of) provide Wayback Machine URLs so that if/when the original URLs go bad (link rot) the archive URL is available, or to give people a way to compare the content associated with a given URL over time (content drift) BTW, we archive all outlinks from all Wikipedia articles from all Wikipedia sites, in near-real-time... so that we are abl…

It's interesting to think about how HTML could be modified to fix the issue. Initial thought: along with HREF, provide AREF- a list of archive links. The browser could automatically try a backup if the main one fails. The user should be able to right-click the link to select a specific backup. Another idea is to allow the web-page author to provide a rewrite rule to automatically generate wayback machine (or whatever…

Yup, I've been using the extension for probably about a year now and get the same issues they do. It really isn't that bad, most of the time backing out of the message once or twice does the trick, but it's funny because most of the time I get that message when going to the IA web uploader.

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#209

Post by shortformblog » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 8:06 PM UTC

jhallenworld wrote: post #205

markjgraham wrote: post #197

We suggest/encourage people link to original URLs but ALSO (as opposed to instead of) provide Wayback Machine URLs so that if/when the original URLs go bad (link rot) the archive URL is available, or to give people a way to compare the content associated with a given URL over time (content drift) BTW, we archive all outlinks from all Wikipedia articles from all Wikipedia sites, in near-real-time... so that we are abl…

It's interesting to think about how HTML could be modified to fix the issue. Initial thought: along with HREF, provide AREF- a list of archive links. The browser could automatically try a backup if the main one fails. The user should be able to right-click the link to select a specific backup. Another idea is to allow the web-page author to provide a rewrite rule to automatically generate wayback machine (or whatever…

This is literally where my brain was going and I was glad to see someone went in the same direction. Given the tag’s addition of srcset in recent years, there is precedent for doing something more with href.

Re: Why I link to Wayback Machine instead of original web content

#210

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Sep 08, 2020, 8:07 PM UTC

bad_user wrote: post #88

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if your personal site is, like so many others these days, on shared IP hosting like Cloudflare, AWS, Fastly, Azure, etc. In the case of Cloudflare, for example, we as users are not reaching the target site, we are just accessing a CDN. The nice thing about archive.org is that it does not require SNI. (Cloudflare's TLS1.3 and ESNI works quite well AFAICT but they are the only CDN who has it working.) I think ther…

The "target site" is the URL from the author's domain, and Cloudflare is the domain's designated CDN. The user is reaching the server that the webmaster wants reachable. That's how the web works. > The nice thing about archive.org is that it does not require SNI I fail to see how that's even a thing to consider.

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