Weeks ago, I used an article by Freeman, L (2022) that discussed what happens when important evidence online gets deleted or disappeared. “Losing My Revolution” by SalahEldeen, H. M. and Nelson, M. L. (2012) analyzes how much content gets lost on social media and how much of it actually gets archived and digitally preserved. They collected data from Twitter and other social media websites to determine which URLS were still operational. Additionally, they utilized the Memento framework, a free online service that allows users to see what a certain URL looked like on a certain date. So, if the URL was active, that would mean that the source still exists. If the URL didn’t work but it was available on Memento, that would mean that the source is preserved but not readily accessible. If the URL wasn’t active and didn’t exist on Memento, then that would mean that it’s lost media.
The authors looked at 6 major world events between between June 2009 and March 2012: the H1N1 virus outbreak, Michael Jackson’s death, the Iranian elections and
protests, Barack Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize, the Egyptian revolution, and the
Syrian uprising (SalahEldeen, H. M. & Nelson, M. L., 2012). They found that after a year of publishing about 11% of social media content would be gone and that we are losing 0.02% daily.
It’s important to note two things: I could not access Memento so I am not sure if it’s still an accessible source for archival content, and this article is 13 years old so the data might not hold up. Regardless of that, I found this study helpful to add to my discussion about how online archival fragility impacts documentation of culturally significant events and hurts collective memory. Last week’s writing exercise encouraged me to start making connections between my sources. So, while I was reading this I was thinking about how the Memento framework relates to Mandolessi’s (2024) point about content not getting truly lost but appearing elsewhere remixed or reworked, Haux et al.’s (2021) point about the lack of uniform standards in terms of proper documentation and preservation, and Freeman’s (2022) point about the loss of important evidence of atrocities in social media.
I started my field research and began writing my introduction for the paper. I met with Jan Fernback on Friday and discussed how I can define my project without making it too broad, especially with the political aspect. I had some moments where I considered touching on censorship as a form of lost media, but didn’t want to open a can of worms as censorship can be a whole project within itself. She helped me identify what points I want to make when it comes to the political side, and we both think leaning towards digital deterioration is sufficient and I don’t need to overcomplicate things with censorship.
I also have two committee members now, woo! And I have studio 2 booked on Friday to film my intro scene/proof of concept. I am excited about how fast things are moving!
Edit: I forgot to add something from the class activity so I’m adding my poem:
Zotero, Premiere, Canva, Highland two
What can we even do with you?
If I have many ideas in head
What do I even shoot?
Routine, perfecting, and organizing
Begging information to be useful, too
References
Freeman, L. (2022). Digitally Disappeared: The Struggle to Preserve Social Media Evidence of Mass Atrocities. Georgetown Journal of International Affairs 23(1), 105-113. https://dx.doi.org/10.1353/gia.2022.0017.
Haux, D. H., Maget Dominicé, A., & Raspotnig, J. A. (2021). A Cultural Memory of the Digital Age? International journal for the semiotics of law , 34(3), 769–782. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-020-09778-7
Mandolessi S. (2024). Memory in the digital age. Open research Europe, 3, 123. https://doi.org/10.12688/openreseurope.16228.2
SalahEldeen, H. M., & Nelson, M. L. (2012). Losing my revolution: How many resources shared on social media have been lost? arXiv. https://arxiv.org/abs/1209.3026
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