“The demise of GeoCities is not just the disappearance of a gif-riddled online ghost town--it's the death of a pioneering online community. And it's a reminder that we should think critically about who owns online spaces, how they are managed, and what happens when they are razed.”
The web is constantly in flux. Just look at memes, they are ever-changing and morphing, their popularity shifting to whatever poorly photoshopped image captures our collective imagination next. One moment everyone has a Myspace account, the next we all jump ship to Facebook, never again to spend hours fiddling with other people's html code in order to get just the right shade of pink for their profile page. We have multiple accounts with email providers, image-hosting sites, social media networks, and blogging sites. But we have no control over these websites, and no control over what they decide to do with their sites in the future. We can upload all the content we like; if the site gets taken down that content may be lost forever (unless you keep a copy of course). It is for these reasons that we cannot expect the internet to be a reliable space to store our cultural or personal history. I believe that some people rely too heavily on the internet to document their lives, and that as we grow older and the internet continues to change, as sites like Facebook that were once an integral part of our everyday lives begin to lose relevancy, we will realise that we have entrusted our histories to a fickle and unreliable beast.
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