Michail Takach

Journal Sentinel Archive Disappears

Entire Google archive of more than a century of stories is gone. Why?

By - Aug 19th, 2016 01:42 pm
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

“Have you ever borrowed a book, thousands of miles away?” asked those visionary AT&T ads of the 1990s. “Have you ever learned special things, from far away places? You will.”

In 1993, this was mind-blowing science fiction. By 2008, we were already there. Google News Archive launched that year with ambitious plans to scan, archive and release the world’s newspapers in a single public access database. Anyone, anywhere, would now be able to read any edition of any newspaper ever printed. It was the closest thing to time travel in human history. Historians, librarians and educators rejoiced: the future was now!

When the project abruptly ended three years later, the project had scanned over a million pages of news from over 2,000 newspapers. Although nobody is entirely sure why the project ended, Google News Archive delivered an incredible gift to Milwaukee: free digital access to more than a century’s worth of local newspapers.

This wasn’t just a revelation; it was a revolution. Aligning perfectly with the rise of social media, Google News Archive content inspired Facebook groups, Twitter feeds, Pinterest boards, and more. By removing barriers to historical content, Google didn’t just trigger a passing interest in local history. Google triggered a groundswell of historical discovery, engagement and pride.

That was then. This is now: on Tuesday, August 16, the Milwaukee Journal, Milwaukee Sentinel, and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel listings vanished from the Google News Archive home page. This change came without any advance warning and still has no official explanation.

As a researcher and author, I relied heavily on Google News Archive to uncover the hidden history of LGBTQ Milwaukee for my recent book on that subject. For years, I’ve bookmarked thousands of articles and images for further exploration at a later date. In one lightning bolt moment, all of my Google News Archive bookmarks went from treasure to trash. There will be no later date. There will be no further exploration.

Google’s response to inquiries was chilling: “Google News Archive no longer has permission to display this content.” The response from a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel employee was even more chilling: “We have contracted with a new vendor (Newsbank.) It is unclear when or if the public will have access to the full inventory that was formerly available on Google News Archive.”

That’s right. If.

Google spent considerable time and money to digitize our history as a cultural contribution. As a for-profit company, Newsbank will essentially privatize these public resources through a paid subscription service. Unfortunately, our community champions for historical preservation – libraries, universities, museums, historical societies – are unlikely to pay the steep ransom price that would restore free public access. Will anyone?

Until someone pays up, local history might just be held hostage.

In 2016, it’s unnerving to realize that digital content actually doesn’t live online forever, and can disappear faster than yesterday’s newspapers. It’s also shocking to think that technological advancement would be deliberately undone. What happened to that all-access future we were promised?

The timing of this change really hurts. Recent editorial choices at Jsonline.com have reduced a powerhouse local production to an ever shrinking news source. Many readers yearn for an earlier, prouder time when local newspapers weren’t just our window to the world, but a trusted source of in-depth, influential local reporting. We already miss a time when local news really mattered. Now, we’ve lost our time machine access to understanding what “local journalism” used to mean.

This isn’t just a Milwaukee problem – the Fourth Estate is in free fall across America, raising the question of what “truth” looks like in the 21st century.

Meanwhile, Newsbank isn’t answering calls.

After living in the future, we’re now being sent back to the past.  Next stop, microfiche reader.

Journal Sentinel Archive Stories

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Categories: History, The Press

53 thoughts on “Journal Sentinel Archive Disappears”

  1. Chris says:

    Doesn’t the public library have archives of most of the newspapers published over time? It’s not as instantly accessible as Google or as easily digitized, but its still there.

  2. hg says:

    Are you saying that the Journal Sentinel archive content should be public domain? Seriously? That is why there has been a fall of newspapers. People don’t want to pay money for what it takes A LOT of money to produce. Do you work for free? Journal Sentinel should make money off their archives.

  3. Daddy2Girls says:

    @hg I don’t think that is what the author is saying at all. Of course it takes a lot of money to produce resources such as the Google News Archive. That isn’t the main issue. It’s the fact that it went away with no explanation or announcement. Whether it should have been distributed freely in the first place is moot. It was there, people used it, and now it’s gone.

    One can only hope that local public and academic libraries will be able to strike a deal to make digital access available again. At that point, though, it will ultimately be the taxpayer’s burden (cue the hue and cry from the usual tax-hating crowd).

  4. Justin says:

    Would http://www.archive.org be an option? They may have caches or their own copies of the archive.

  5. Mjp says:

    MPL does have access to 1935-1980 and 1990-present of the Milwaukee Journal. It can be accessed via their website, although a library card is needed.

  6. Dave Reid says:

    @Mjp It is our understanding that the 1935-1980 set is a pilot and could go away as well.

  7. Virginia Small says:

    Thanks Michail for this excellent reporting. This is a sobering story about shrinking access to information and vulnerability in the digital world. Yes, the service was originally part of an ambitious service provided by the monolithic corporation with the motto “Don’t be evil” (not exactly the same as “Do good.”).

    As just about every bit of info gets “monetized” by Google and others, we may all be subject to less information and more monetizing.

    That’s why libraries, colleges and other public institutions/archives are so important and must be safeguarded. Without them our civic and cultural life will be gradually–or abruptly–shattered.

  8. happyjack27 says:

    1. I get the economic thing – print news is a victum of disruptive technology. You pay for the story when it comes out, why shouldn’t you pay for an archive? Then again, the value of news deprecates very quickly. Analgous to television: people will pay for to watch a sports game live, not quite the same when it’s from last year.

    2. Problem with microfieche is it’s not electronically searchable. If you wanted to know how e.g. a news source treated 2 different candidates in an election, you could just write a script to search for their names and pull out the surrounding sentences. That’ll give you a frequency, too. Microfieche? Not so much. I mean, you could run it through OCR (which will cost a pretty penny for enterprise-class OCR software), but then would that be stealing?

  9. GDP says:

    With a library card the Milwaukee Public Library provides 19th Century U.S. Newspapers that includes material from Milwaukee papers.

    “19th Century U.S. Newspapers, from Gale, provides access to historic primary source newspapers, featuring full content and images from numerous urban and rural publications throughout the U.S. Wisconsin newspapers are well represented, including significant runs of The Milwaukee Journal, Milwaukee Sentinel, and Wisconsin State Journal. Library subscription database. Available for use within MPL libraries and for remote use by City of Milwaukee library cardholders.”

    They also provide access to NewspaperARCHIVE:

    “These newspapers, from every state in the U. S. and around the world, supply great sources for primary history and genealogy accounts. More than 700 Wisconsin newspapers are included, and Milwaukee is represented by the Milwaukee Sentinel, the Milwaukee Daily American, the Wisconsin Banner and approximately 40 others. HINT: Try all versions of a newspaper’s name. For example, the Milwaukee Sentinel appears under multiple listings, such as the Daily Sentinel and Gazette, Milwaukie Sentinel, and the longest span appears as the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel. Provided as part of Wisconsin’s BadgerLink program.”

    Finally, BadgerLink (a statewide project) in Wisconsin licenses other newspaper resources including the Archive of Wisconsin Newspapers.
    http://badgerlink.dpi.wi.gov/resources?field_format_tid=469&field_classroom_subject_tid=All&field_user_group_tid=All&field_vendor_tid=All

    While the MPL might not provide all of these resources it’s likely other public libraries in the area do. You might be able to get a library card.

    However, even better, BadgerLink, a statewide project, offers database resources to ALL WISCONSIN RESIDENTS.
    http://badgerlink.dpi.wi.gov

    http://badgerlink.dpi.wi.gov/get-word-out

    You can even request auto access from BadgerLink.

    Also, back when the Google News Archive program ended I reported on it. The project went away with little notice to users and the newspapers themselves. This lack of early or any warning is fairly common with Google.

    See this post from 2011, It includes passages from the letter Google sent to newspaper partners.
    http://www.infodocket.com/2011/05/20/so-long-google-is-ending-its-newspaper-digitization-project/

    __gary

  10. Ted Chisholm says:

    Thanks for articulating the frustration I felt as well when I saw the archive had disappeared. As someone interested in local history, this was a fascinating window into our past, and it’s something that anyone should have access to.

  11. gdp says:

    As a librarian and writer I would like to encourage all of you to take some time looking at what MPL, BadgerLink, and other libraries offer online, 24x7x365. All you need is a library card.

    Assembling, digitizing, maintaining, etc. these resources cost money. They offer much more precise searching (vs Google) if you take the time to investigate but basic searching also works.

    These databases are fee-based but the cost is underwritten by the library or library consortium, etc.

    Here’s one (of many) examples:
    Milwaukee Public Library offers Academic Search Premier.
    http://www.mpl.org/databases/all/2

    This database provides access (full text and in some cases full image) for thousands of academic journals, the ones often found behind firewalls. If interested, this web page lists all of the titles available.
    https://www.ebscohost.com/titleLists/aph-subject.htm

    To HappyJack27.
    Speaking of TV, you might enjoy these resources.

    1. C-SPAN Video Library
    Just about everything that has ever aired on C-SPAN. Even better, words spoken are keyword searchable. More than Congressional debates. Thousands of author interviews, lectures. etc.
    Over 224,000 hours of material.
    https://www.c-span.org/about/videoLibrary/

    2. Political TV Ad Archive. 2016 campaign ads. Searchable.
    https://politicaladarchive.org/

    3. TV News Archive
    https://archive.org/details/tv
    Keyword search words spoken on tv programs. There are some limitations but overall a wonderful and important resource especially for the price…FREE!!!

  12. Mr. Michael Horne says:

    Chris, the archive at the library is not searchable by current standards. It is microfilm with a partial card catalog index.
    An analogy would be with internet chess games. In the era we must revert to, long distance chess games would be played by penny post card, one move at a time.
    Took months.

  13. I share Mikhail’s distress and point out that someone –Google? — initally paid to put this online until three years ago and it was an expensive project that never found a way to sell itsself. If the Gannett Corp. wants to charge a fee, fine. But I speak as a former editor at Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and know how active were discussions to digitalize the library. I am distressed not from general history perspectove alone but from the perspective of those who covered the world. For me there are decades of writing on theater and film no longer available and I suspect this, too, was useful history. Public Library microfiche is unsearchable unless you know the exact date and section and even that is time-consuming. Decades of these papers serving as the paper of record are now lost to the general community. And based on experience, unless the public screams, these searchable files will have vanished into Newsbank.

  14. Linn says:

    @gdp Many states have online resources but fail to support our mobile society. “All you need is a library card” doesn’t provide access to databases in the other 49 states.

  15. Ted Chisholm says:

    I doubt this will carry great weight with the Gannett folks, but here’s a petition asking for restored access to the archives: http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/chris-stegman-restore.fb47?source=c.fb&r_by=13089529

  16. happyjack27 says:

    Out librarian friend said that they’ve digitized the text.

  17. Mark Mariucci says:

    I think this is probably due to Gannett buying the newspaper. They most likely contracted with Newsback for all their properties and Newsbank probably demands an exclusive. I blame the copyright process that allows this content to still be protected for far longer than it should be. Really old news should be in the public domain to serve the public.

  18. Kay Kirscht says:

    Those archives allowed me to *finally* discover who the people were, in the 1880s photo album I just donated to the Milwaukee Historical Society (the J. Gralow album is being digitized, and hopefully, will be available soon).

    I’d been searching for those folks for years. Local news coverage of the time provided the golden key.
    And now it’s all been sold off to a paywall news database?

  19. Milton Findley says:

    There are 21 ads on this page alone. I assume that somebody is paying for them, even as I am afflicted with them. Well, the ones that meet the ad-block standards for ads anyway.

  20. Hugh W Swofford says:

    I was so distressed too because I am working on another Milwaukee history project and wanted to find background on
    the family I am looking for, I have newspaper articles on the death of all of the important people but I would need
    newspaper references about them. I went to look for them and they were GONE. That was terrible.

  21. John Foust says:

    The first assault was not keeping the paper copies. (Read Nicholson Baker’s book “Double Fold.”) Microfilming has its flaws. There’s a front-page headline story about one of my relatives in a 1908 edition of the Evening Wisconsin, a once-popular Milwaukee paper. I can read the headline but none of the story as the microfilm was overexposed, and paper copies no longer exist.

  22. Gary says:

    Kate, I hope you included the local German language press for your scrapbook collection.
    An index of those papers (mpl.org) shows Gralow families represented from the early 1870s-1890s: Miss Anna, Ferdinand (26 yr, survived by Ludwig & Franziska), Ludwig (70 yrs), Ludwig (23 yr; survived by Ludwig & Franziska, Pauline & James Louis); Otto A.

    But sticking to this thread: just 2 weeks ago an employee of Milwaukee Public Library advised me to sell my 8000 pgs. of German-American family research data. Part of the work was cataloged in their collection in Sept. 2008: “Milwaukee’s German Newspapers; an index of death notices and related items”. The index covers everyone else AND the beer barons, from 1844-1950, and includes much more than paid death notices (a variety of 293,000+ paid notices with biographical content indexed so far).

    That’s the extent of the imagination expressed by the local people I’ve talked to since 2007. A project at MPL based on my ongoing work, and a public access terminal, are my restrictions on an outright gift of the data. Other local orgs. had their opportunity back in 2007-2009 but most ignored requests for a presentation of the project.

  23. gdp says:

    1. Newsbank’s Milwaukee Journal database is NOT a NEW resource and the MPL already provides FREE, REMOTE access to it with a library card. West Allis also provides remote access.

    See: http://mpl.org/databases/all/66
    Newsbank also sells access to articles for a fee but why pay directly when the library already provides 24×7 access to it?
    Btw, West Allis cardholders also have remote access.

    2. Some of you might be interested in the Wisconsin Historical Newspaper Portal that was announced last year.
    http://www.wplc.info/node/286

    3. Another wonderful resource (FREE): Recollection Wisconsin, Over 200,000 historical related items with more to come.
    http://recollectionwisconsin.org/

    4. @Lin

    Not sure what you mean. “Our mobile society.”

    Go to any library and get a card. Almost all libraries in the US, Canada, and other locations around the world offer remotely accessible databases either locally, and/or by way of a regional or statewide consortium.

    You can access these databases 24×7 FROM anywhere in the world (even while flying over the Atlantic) and on mobile devices.

    Re: Older newspapers?
    Have you seen Chronicling America? From NEH and Library of Congress.
    Free.
    Millions of digitized newspapers from the around the U.S. Constantly updated. Sadly, no Wisconsin newspapers are available at this time.
    http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/
    Part of the National Digital Newspaper program.
    http://www.neh.gov/divisions/preservation/national-digital-newspaper-program

    Btw, here’s a video about the Wisconsin Newspaper Archive available from Badgerlink. Over 200 papers but not Journal.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klcv9S1_6Uk

    Finally, why not any outrage for Google completely abandoning the project in the first place? They sure have vast resources both human and financial. Remember, Google at one point said that digitizing all newspapers was their plan. Why did a company with Google’s resources just thrown in the towel? Perhaps they wanted to spend the money elsewhere. Digitizing newspapers, adding metadata, maintaining the database is expensive. As I said yesterday, Google’s shutdown came as a surprise to many partners.

  24. j dean says:

    We should rethink the preservation of our historical documents.
    Just as we have legal safeguards to protect and preserve landmarks and other historic items, we need to push for legislation to better protect and retain access to our written history in various formats. We can’t let be held hostage to unreliable financial interests.
    Newspapers are a de-facto public record. After a point, this information loses status as private property and should be readily–and affordably–available.

  25. James Worzala says:

    Really a great resource for research that’s gone.

  26. Jeanne says:

    When I first found the archive, the first thing I did was look up the obits for my grandmothers and grandfathers. My grandmother died in 1948, just two years after I was born. I never really knew her, but I knew the date and could find it in the archive. It was a connection to the past for me that I treasured. It was truly amazing that I could find this bit of my history. It is very sad that people will no longer be able to look into their own past. I’m still a daily and Sunday subscriber to the Journal, and when the Sentinel was a separate paper, I was a subscriber to that also. If someone has been a subscriber to all papers for 50 years, the Journal should listen to us.

  27. Daniel Smith says:

    Hugh Swofford have you looked here or I guess the library of congress?
    they may have another scan of it.

    http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/

    http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Content.aspx?dsNav=N%3A4294963828-4294963805&dsRecordDetails=R%3ACS1590

    Dan Smith
    Houston
    🙂

  28. Dick R. says:

    As the main contributor to the Milwaukee Polonia Project I have spent hundred of hours reading the old issues of the MJ and MS on Google News. It was a constant source of enjoyment for me, reminding me of my Milwaukee childhood, and giving me insights to the lives of my parents and grandparents, all of whom grew up in Milwaukee. Of course, it wasn’t just about my family. I was able to learn more about the whole community by reading the stories of daily lives of countless individuals who will never make it into history books. One of my goals for the MPP blog was to share those life stories with the broader community. (For example, every Memorial Day, I would post little blurbs about some of the Milwaukee natives killed while serving their country.) I’m extremely sorry that this resource is now cut off from me. It is a very sad day for me and for anyone with an interest in the history of Milwaukee.

  29. Dick R. says:

    As the main contributor of the Milwaukee Polonia Project blog, I’ve spent hundreds of hours reading old issues of MJ and MS on Google News Archive. It gave me a greater insight not only into my own childhood, but also in the lives of my parents and grandparents, all have whom lived spent their entire lives in Milwaukee. Of course, it was not just about my family. Those papers were filled with wonderful stories about the lives of ordinary people; stories that will never make it into the history books but which gave one a greater understanding of our community. One of my goals of the MMP blog was to share some of those stories with the world. For example, for Memorial Day, I customarily would post small stories and photographs of the some of the Milwaukee natives who had been killed serving their country. Much of that information would come from the old MJ and MS. Now that is lost to me, and I can no longer share it. It is a very sad day for me and for anyone with a interest in the history of Milwaukee.

  30. Dominique Paul Noth says:

    Michael, I’ve had the same fate — dozens of bookmarks or electronic equivalent wiped out by unannounced casual action by Gannett. I don’t know if the JS Library kept up with the paper clipping of the past and they have their own tedious microfiche, I believe, but they are not only robbing outside journalists, historians and interested members of the public (who may have had stories about their own or their families involvement) — are they also robbing their own reporters?

  31. Paul Heaton says:

    I can understand frustration for no longer being able to access for free content that was previously available. However, I find it ironic that the author’s demand for continued free content is emblematic of the attitude and expectations of the public contributing to the very demise of print media that the author laments. Perhaps the author should decide whether he wants free archive access to past editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, or the continued existence of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. It takes money to keep the trains running.

  32. Daddy2Girls says:

    @Paul Heaton What “demand”? He’s lamenting the loss of the resource, not calling for it to be free always and forever.

    The case calls for a different model, for sure, but the content holders should find a way to balance public access with their own sustainability and profit. They could have given a sunset date on Google Archive access. Perhaps give access to those who will pay for a premium digital subscription (current news plus archival access.) There are better, more public-friendly ways to have handled the situation. The way Gannett did it was crap.

  33. Virginia Small says:

    I am a JS subscriber, as I suspect some other commenters are. One sad aspect of this saga is that media conglomerates, whether Gannett or Google, no longer seem to honor any sense of concern for their subscribers/users. When money is the overriding (and sometimes only) value, the greater good (or even mutual benefit) ceases to have any meaning.

    For those who made the decisions leading to this abrupt dissolution, Milwaukee is just a point on a massive holdings map–not a metro area with individuals who care about their history and each other–and who have over time financially supported the evolution of the disappeared archives.

  34. Rob says:

    Thank you Michail. I have been completely gutted since the sudden disappearance of our newspaper archives. I had countless links related to genealogy as well as general interest ads/articles about Milwaukee. I am absolutely devastated that this Newsbank has taken our history and locked it away. There have been times in history when people have organized and fought for the right to information and education. If you plan to fight back, you can count me in.

  35. Jon Prain says:

    Oh, BOO HOO, some people’s favorite online freebie disappeared. Build a bridge—and get over it. I have been a researcher for 46 years. Until “recently”, in order to access any archive you pretty much had to physically go to the location and search through the holdings of that archive with your own eyes—page by page–word for word. That option still exists. The only thing that some people lost was a free and easy way to search a certain newspaper archive from anywhere. Suck it up, Buttercup. No one owes you an archive–neither online or in a bricks and mortar building. No one ever had to save these newspapers in the first place. Be happy that some entity devoted the time, energy (and many square feet of storage space) over the decades to even have the newspapers available to scan for this google project. It is not the government’s job, or the newspapers’ job or the library’s job or the taxpayers’ job to make these resources available at all–and definitely they have no obligation to offer them online and free of charge. Every six months to a year, I get out my own wallet and I personally pay several subscriptions in order to have 24/7 online access to many newspapers, magazines, and databases. Others can do the same. The other options are to get a library card to access local things (and/or travel to a distant library / archive) and access things the old fashioned way.

  36. Daddy2Girls says:

    @Jon Prain So how long have you worked for Newsbank?

  37. Rob says:

    I agree Jon Prain. Let’s make Earth a terrible place to live.

    I don’t want to physically go to locations to do research. I want to do it right here in my living room like I was doing last week. My family has been paying for Milwaukee Journals/Sentinels since the 19th century. If you need more of my money, Jon, then charge me, but at least give me that option.

  38. Phil D says:

    Rob:

    OK, so stay at home.

    The Milwaukee Public Library offers databases you can access at home, office or elsewhere and for free. They’ve been mentioned several times in this thread. Moreover a new Urban Milwaukee article makes it sound like the JS archive will be available at some point.

    In fact, MPL ALREADY offers FREE remote access (STAY At home) to a Newsbank database with the past 26 years of JS articles and thousands of other newspapers, magazines, etc.

  39. happyjack27 says:

    “Until “recently”, in order to access any archive you pretty much had to physically go to the location and search through the holdings of that archive with your own eyes—page by page–word for word. ”

    This is an “appeal to tradition” fallacy. The fact that things were one way in the past has no bearing on whether they should be one way now. As such it falls under the broader category of fallacies of irrelevance.

    It is easy to find an example to illustrate the absurdity of this fallacy: “Oh boo hoo, we always mixed the sick people with the healthy people in an outbreak of an epidemic. Suck it up. …”

    No, the decision and judgement should be based on the relative merits of the available options. We could be having this conversation over postal mail, and in fact, that’s the way these things were done in the past (if at all). But that’s no argument against doing it over the internet, any more than it is for doing it over postal mail.

    The relative merits are what counts, tradition is entirely irrelevant.

  40. Rob says:

    Sweet, the past 26 years. I’m so excited to step back in time and explore the Clinton Years.

  41. Robert says:

    Precisely the reason I do not archive anything of importance on the cloud. Rue the day we will no longer be able to purchase hard copy of application and programs. Once the Microsoft migrates ala Apple their platforms to the cloud on a rental basis, No one will be immune from having all their data suck into the black hole of software control.

  42. Phil B. says:

    Rob:

    As I said they’ve got MANY databases loaded with FULL TEXT articles going back much further than 26 years.

    I also learned about this database from a post earlier in this thread.

    Millions of digitized newspaper articles back to 1832. No library card is needed
    http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/

    My point is that more and more material is available from home or elsewhere and free to community members.

    Databases like the one above and fee-based databases that you can access for free with a public library card without leaving your home.

    Btw, I also learned about this dbase from a comment in this thread. Amazing and free.
    https://www.c-span.org/about/videoLibrary/

  43. Jerry B. says:

    Journal president, Chris Stegman, says it will be back “soon.”
    http://myinforms.com/en-me/a/40439260-newspaper-disappearing-archive-only-temporary/

  44. SortingHat says:

    Eventually *hopefully not thru Trump* we are going to be required to wear a THYNK pad which the government will monitor our thoughts/potential crime waves just for thinking negative things and they can use it to simulate psyops designed to get us to go their socialist one world banking agenda.

    It will start with criminals who have felony records then the shadow government will institute some nut case right wing attack that will spark the need for thought control in all 57 US States. Well 57 in the minds of President Oh Vommit!

    The liberals only promised us the all instant access and the future of computing being *good* just to get us to vote them in office as they had no power during the Bush era and were throwing a tantrum. Now that they are in power they are throwing the money away doing what they accused the opposite party of doing.

    If Al Gore was President the internet would’ve been already taxed out of existence to where the rich as in anybody who makes a wage above a certified Doctor could only afford it.

  45. SortingHat says:

    As long as you retards keep on arguing over stupid stuff the rich will continue to get richer and find ways to screw us so we can’t find out the truth. We will be soon if not already be living in the movie known as Idiocracy where all we do is stare at naked butts since we cannot afford to pay 1,000$ to research on the web.

    If the web goes all rental model that 10$ will soon be hundreds of dollars if you like to go to a lot of sites or you could just numb your mind and stare at someone’s naked butt and other abstract art for free payed for by tax payers into the liberal arts fund!

  46. SortingHat says:

    If I could get the materials I’d make some fertilizer bombs and if I had transportation I would use these bombs to blow up some of the rich companies main HQ’s to liquidate their assets and show them we are the 99 percent and we will not be bullied by out of control capitalism or Hyper Capitalism.

    That is the scary but necessary third option. Karl Marx is right in we are in the stage where capitalism is not able to afford to pay for itself.

  47. Of course the information is available but access is the problem. The archive allowed us to get material by acting as an index to it. I got some valuable material for a project at the VERY end but the point was it was withdrawn without ANY notice!!!

  48. Postuma Texas says:

    I have seen a jpg of the Milwaukee Journal for August 31, 1939 – The headline reads,”Hitler Gives 16 Point Peace Plan”
    Not exactly unknown history but pretty well hidden and now the url gives a 404. A very reasonable plan and would have averted WWII, but some people didn’t want peace.

  49. Tim says:

    Postuma Texas, was Hitler offering the type of peace plan it offered the Russians? Where a couple years later they attacked anyway?

    20,000,000 soviets died from that mistake, I wonder how many American lives would have been lost if we made the same.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties_of_the_Soviet_Union

  50. SortingHat says:

    It’s because of smartphones. Who is going to read a newspaper on such a little screen? It’s not going to be fun that’s for sure so nobody would do it unless they had to. Google saw it coming and abandoned the attempts. So did Microsoft with their push towards smartphones on computers. Their (Microsoft) with Steve Ballmer thought that phones and PC’s could be merged together but it wounded up being a catastrophic mess. He got fired but before that he fired thousands of PC workers and put in Nokia phone techs. In an interview later during the Windows 10 development he said that phones and PC’s cannot coexist they are way too different despite both having CPU’s and processors the aim is way too different.

    That is why Windows 10 is a broken OS and just freezes a lot of computers up. If you have a tablet or notebook designed for Windows 10 then likely no troubles will occur since there is no conflicting pieces of hardware but if you are a dinosaur like me and use anything bigger it is already too old to be compatible. Be prepared to pull your hair out.
    My answer. Downgrade to Windows 7 and keep updates off especially the safe disc one that prevents many older software that relies on DRM from the early 2000s from running. I’m not lying!

  51. SortingHat says:

    IBM has resorted back to electric and manual typewriters because they do not trust the information always being there and that was during the Windows 8 era when things were being pushed towards smartphones only. Hell this site is an example where you have to zoom in on the text if you use a large monitor. It is designed for tablet size reading and while it may load on a PC it’s appearance is for mobile first.

    Google forced it that way too in 2014 if your website isn’t phone friendly meeting certain criteria you won’t be listed. Period.

  52. SortingHat says:

    Somehow between the Bush and Obama era humanity went sideways and that killed the web. Now it’s all social BS with only a few nuggets of truth in there but mostly the web is now a social media propaganda machine with fake news fighting fake news.

    It’s like our old world got destroyed and the only way to access it is thru archives otherwise we are stuck in the dawn of a “new order” and this order doesn’t want people to be self sufficient.

    The bible says woe to those who live in the cities without walls.

  53. SortingHat says:

    Somehow between the Bush and Obama era humanity went sideways and that killed the web. Now it’s all social BS with only a few nuggets of truth in there but mostly the web is now a social media propaganda machine with fake news fighting fake news.

    It’s like our old world got destroyed and the only way to access it is thru archives otherwise we are stuck in the dawn of a “new order” and this order doesn’t want people to be self sufficient.

    The bible says woe to those who live in the cities without walls. In the old days cities had walls to protect them from attack.

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