Geocities Rescue links

[arduinna]

It's starting to get down to the wire on rescuing Geocities pages -- I think the purge has already started, given some pages I suddenly can't find -- and there's a staggering amount that hasn't been done yet.

So I thought maybe it would be good to have a post where people could at least leave links to Geocities pages, maybe with a very short description of what they are, so wiki editors would have a starting place. (Links to screencaps of existing pages would also be awesome, so those could be uploaded to Fanlore later, but that would be icing.)

That way, even if not everything gets done, we have a chance of being able to find these pages on the Wayback Machine later -- once we lose the links, we've lost our chance.

I'm already starting to see this:

Comments

[arduinna]

We need basically everything. *g* Links, email addies, screencaps, promotion, you name it - there's a lot that is helpful that doesn't include directly editing in Fanlore.

It's not that there's a ton of people behind the GRP; it's a small group of people making a resource available and trying to get the word out as far as possible. But a big part of that is counting on people to spread the word. If you could do that - post about the project with links back to the project page and things like this post, and/or send out a letter to authors/archivists, that would be fantastic! We need that really badly.

And screencaps would also be hugely useful! Post them in comments here, or hell, send them to me directly and I'll get them up into Fanlore, whatever. Someone else will totally do the work of transferring info over for you, that's no problem at all.

We want any and all sites - fic, information, link listings, awards, you name it. (For fic sites, we want screencaps of something like the front page, just something to give an idea of the feel of the site, and maybe a listing of the stories; for resource/link pages, more extensive screencaps would be awesome, so we don't lose the information.)

As for what's being done with the links here - hopefully everything! *g* I know I've written to people with fic sites on Geocities to point them to Open Doors and tell them about the beta accounts available on AO3 for fic hosted on Geocities; other people are doing the same. But I think either way, it's just as important to get a record into Fanlore and/or to collect links to find things on Wayback later; a lot of the fannish sites on geocities were fanfic, but lots were info sites, resources, links pages, screencap galleries, etc.

So at the very least, I'm hoping we can record these sites' existence before they vanish.

So yes, regarding your last paragraph, we totally need people willing to:

- post links here, with or without email addies (with would be fabulous, without is fine)

- see if a geocities site has moved somewhere else (although in a lot of cases, the "new" url is dead, and only the old Geocities version exists, I'm finding), and post that here

- write to people with fic archived on Geocities and tell them about the option to host their work on AO3

- take screencaps of Geocities sites and put them somewhere Fanlore editors can access them to upload to Fanlore (if you can't do photobucket or similar, you can email them directly to me at my gmail addy and I'll do something with them: arduinna at gmail dot com)

- spread the word about the Geocities Rescue Project as far and wide as possible, with links back to the project

If it would be easier to do screencaps off a list, I can pull together all the links that have been added at some point, and we can cross them off as they get screencapped. (That won't happen today, but I can do it later.)

[(Anonymous)]

I went and started on Fanlore earlier today anyway, despite my best intentions, and spent hours documenting one site, so I begin to see the *scale* of the project.

But I don't know how you're keeping track of what's already been done. I know it might be more work but a googlespreadsheet or the like with all the sites to be recorded/people to be contacted would be really useful, so the same thing isn't done twice and stuff doesn't get left out. I could start one of everything posted here so far if you want.

I thought maybe contacting the mods of fandom newsletters (these ones http://fanlore.org/wiki/Newsletter/Newsletter_Communities) and the like, and asking them to post a PSA? Do you have a standard announcement or do I just make something up?

I also have had a look at the Geocities Rescue Project page, and it is a little bare. I think if you don't want to be explaining the same thing to people over and over again, it could really use some expansion on exactly how to document a site on Fanlore, rather than just "contact open doors", and maybe more of the rescued pages and a link to here. People might be more willing to drop links than email.

Poi