Would you like access to the VF Forum in the Internet Archives?

[Vintage VFer]

I voted "No" to the Archives.

As Edina said in a episode of "Absolutely Fabulous" (1992):

"You know I had a speech, you know, my... my integrated-projected-global-tele-network system bloody system-system. But you know, if that's what the worlds coming to I don't want to be in it. No I don't want that. I don't want to be in some sort of cyber-space-hypervirtual bloody reality. I don't want that- exchanging e-mails with some old age bloody hippies with more information at their fingertips than is safe to know about. I don't want that! What kind of reality is that, huh, you know, with a thirteen-amp plug on the end of it? Huh? Huh?... That can be un-plugged like that? Come-on I'm going ."

[KathAL79]

Well, I would have to add that as my knowledge grows and my opinions change, I'm not excited about the fact that someone would find an old post and think it necessarily represents a fact or my true opinion. I realize sometimes that maybe I say more than I should and/or don't think before I type when posting here, too, and I'm not comfortable having such things taken out of context by unknown persons.

I guess I'm also wary because several years ago I was "quoted" in a national publication, which resulted in my name thrown around the Internet as a poster child for what was wrong with [a certain something]. It's frightening to see what shows up when my real name is Googled, especially since I will be looking for a job in that field when I graduate. That's the main reason I'm very, very nervous about having such things archived for all eternity.

If you find a thread that provides a lot of information or that you like, it's easy enough to print it out or save it in another program. I have a yoga challenge from last year saved in Word, for example.

[Elisa B.]

Originally Posted by Lianne

I think it's a shame to let fear and paranoia eliminate a good thing.

I think that's a little harsh.

Over the years, there's been a bit of a divide between people who see the forum primarily as an information source and those who see it primarily as a conversation. Thus we had the battle over whether it is necessary to do a search before asking a question.

I'm here for the conversation, not to write deathless prose that should be archived forever. Just like when I sit in a coffee shop with a friend, having a conversation, I don't feel the need to make a podcast and put it on the internet.

Honestly, it's not a huge issue to me, I was just expressing a preference. It's not something I would leave the forum over. If I was really paranoid, I don't think I'd use my real name here, or hang out with people I met here, on the scary internet.

Elisa

[Sophie]

Although I do like searching for and finding stuff, generally speaking, I voted no for this particular forum. Mostly because I think that although there is a lot of useful information at VF, there's also a lot of personal information shared because of the back-and-forth conversational context.

I might feel differently about other forums and other internet communities, though.

I do like being able to search for my posts from within VF, I guess, mostly for reference, and to jar my sieve-like memory.

[KarenP]

Originally Posted by Elisa B.

I'm here for the conversation, not to write deathless prose that should be archived forever. Just like when I sit in a coffee shop with a friend, having a conversation, I don't feel the need to make a podcast and put it on the internet.

This is it exactly. This is an informal discussion board.

[Sophie]

Originally Posted by Elisa B.

Just like when I sit in a coffee shop with a friend, having a conversation, I don't feel the need to make a podcast and put it on the internet.

But I gotta confess - sometimes those are the podcasts I love to listen to the most

[jaj999]

Originally Posted by Lianne

Just for interest sake I just did the following search using Google:

"Elisa B." yoga videofitness

and I got results from your forum postings - so it appears that it isn't stopping Google, yet it is stopping the Internet Archive.

It's odd that posts came up on Google (unless they were cached before Wendy put her block up. I checked it and it should successfully block any well-behaved crawler (which Google's is. She didn't just block the internet archive crawler.

[hch]

I can see both sides, but I voted "yes" yesterday, if only to be a contrarian.

Obviously you don't need Internet Archive to archive--I wasn't even going to post until I read the way the conversation's been going into today.

- My own position is similar to Lianne's--not about the Internet Archive per se, though, but about archiving. [In this post, all general references to "archives" are VF-specific.] I'd like to see the archives preserved; I'd like to have the opportunity to see posts if I wanted to, even if they're old (does anyone keep old workout logs--or does anyone throw away old photos simply because they're old?). I'd see deleting old threads simply because they're old (or letting them fade into vapor) almost like wiping out history or letting it disappear.

- I also agree on the searching: here's to hoping that upcoming versions of the software have or are compatible with better search functions.

- I do appreciate that storage space is limited, and I do see that it's easier and less dicey to delete old check-ins wholesale than picking through them to see what's least worthy of saving , but I'd rather not see that happening either. Lots of Yoga Check-In history has simply disappeared, and with it lots of informative and interesting conversation. I've saved some of the old check-ins, but I don't agree entirely with

Originally Posted by KathAL79

If you find a thread that provides a lot of information or that you like, it's easy enough to print it out or save it in another program. I have a yoga challenge from last year saved in Word, for example.

because newbies don't have the same opportunity.

- Where am I on using the Internet Archive? At the risk of being unpopular, I wouldn't really mind, especially as I'm very private anyway and don't share information on publicly accessible boards, no matter how searchable they are. I can see why others would be uncomfortable, though, and I respect them, especially if they aren't opposed to the mere idea of keeping old posts archived and searchable within VF.

(No, a thousand times no, I don't want to restrict VF reading access to registered members only without some extremely good reason.)

[hch]

- What really made me post was seeing the old "information"/"conversation" split brought up.

Originally Posted by Joanna

I also question whether anything on this forum really is so timeless and eternal that it needs to be saved that long. i am thinking here of the thread for a few days ago where people posted about going back and reading their old reviews and wondering what they were thinking! If, ten years from now, someone really wants information about Walk Away the Pounds or Richard Simmons or whatever, and the web page of reviews is not sufficient for them, they can always come to the forum and re-ask it.

Whether I'd agree with you depends on how I read this. I think that nearly nothing on VF is so "timeless" and "eternal" compared to [insert important piece of literature here], but again, has anyone here tossed her old love letters because her boyfriend's love poems were no Shakespeare?

I'm interested in history; sometimes I'm interested in old books, not because I think that what they're saying is still true or valuable in themselves, but because they preserve ideas, viewpoints, and less exalted things that can inform us (directly or indirectly), entertain us, warn us, or whatever else. (After scouring the leftovers of a rummage sale, where I picked up an old P.E. book, I was actually excited to have a list of exercises that Girls Shouldn't Do in my hot little hands.)

What I said goes for old VF posts as well as old books. As I wrote earlier this week in something that I haven't yet posted, we have Lenore Levine in the archives; I never met her in person or probably talked a lot with her on VF, and this memory of her posts is the best memory of her that I have.

Originally Posted by Elisa B.

Over the years, there's been a bit of a divide between people who see the forum primarily as an information source and those who see it primarily as a conversation. Thus we had the battle over whether it is necessary to do a search before asking a question.

Maybe I'm too much of a both-and person, but I really don't get why there must be such a split between "information" and "conversation," even though--if I had to choose a "side"--I'm squarely, proudly, and defiantly on the "information" side, enough that I can post a list of my dubious little qualifications.

Don't you think that you can write an "informative" post in a "conversational" way, switch modes unobtrusively in the same post, or something?

Originally Posted by Elisa B.

I'm here for the conversation, not to write deathless prose that should be archived forever.

[Agreeing with the above:]

Originally Posted by KarenP

This is an informal discussion board.

I hope that no one's saying that "information" people or their posts don't belong. I'm here for the information, not to write prose that dies the next day and should never be unearthed again ,* but I'm not here to deny "conversation" people any fun, and no one who wants archives is forcing anyone else to read them. You who've posted probably know this, heh, but I do want to present another side in this thread.

* By the way, I don't really think that "conversation" dies the next day and should never be unearthed again, but what's the proper counterpart to "eternal," "timeless," and "deathless"?

After all, when I read

Originally Posted by Elisa B.

Just like when I sit in a coffee shop with a friend, having a conversation, I don't feel the need to make a podcast and put it on the internet.

I can't improve on this response:

Originally Posted by Sophie

But I gotta confess - sometimes those are the podcasts I love to listen to the most

[Joanna]

I guess for me, I am just uncomfortable with the *retroactivity* of it. If, for example, there was a way to only do it for posts from this day onward, and all new members new of this rule, that would be fine and I would restrict my posts accordingly. I don't think I give out too much personal, identifiable info here. But at the same time, I have been burned in the past by an identifiable last name and a post or two somewhere that I did not know would be archived for all time (for example, the aforementioned usenet posts from when I was a teen). I don't think it is fair to tell people that things they said off the cuff are now going to be saved forever. If you want to save it forever, I think you should only be allowed to archive things people KNOW are going to be archived. Maybe if my last name was Smith, I wouldn't be so paranoid. Certainly, I am a LOT more careful now than I was when I was a kid. But some of the stuff people posted on the net in the past was posted before the idea of the internet archive and google caches were stuff people even considered as possibilities---and now, everything they said is saved forever, often with no way for the person to remove it. That is REALLY scary to me. They DID NOT KNOW that it would be saved forever, and it IS. I really don't see how that can be anything but an invasion of privacy. As I said, I am fine with starting afresh and all posts from such and such day forward being saved, but I would have a huge problem with stuff from the past that was written under the assumption of transience being retroactively archived against my will.