If most of the Internet is AI-generated slop (as is already the case), is there really any value in expensing so much bandwidth and storage to preserve it? And on the flip side, I'd imagine the value of a pre-2022 (ChatGPT launch) Internet snapshot on physical media will probably increase astronomically.

▲

nicole_express 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The sites that are most valuable to preserve are likely the same ones that are most likely to put up barriers to archiving

▲

ninjagoo 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Perhaps the AI slop isn't worth preserving, but the unarchivability of news and other useful content has implications for future public discourse, historians, legal matters and who knows what else.

In the past libraries used to preserve copies of various newspapers, including on microfiche, so it was not quite feasible to make history vanish. With print no longer out there, the modern historical record becomes spotty if websites cannot be archived.

Perhaps there needs to be a fair-use exception or even a (god forbid!) legal requirement to allow archivability? If a website is open to the public, shouldn't it be archivable?

	▲	phatfish an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Erm, there is still a newspaper stand in the supermarket I go to (Wallmart for the Americans). Not sure if the British library keeps a copy of the print news I see, but they should!