Lycos/Angelfire/Tripod going down for the last time?

Webweaving
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One of my passions is finding old websites with linkware websets but it’s hard when I can only find the site on the Wayback Machine because sometimes it’s practically a complete snapshot and sometimes it’s a background with a lot of broken graphic icons. I could always count on Lycos/Angelfire/Tripod sites, though! They had staying power and I thought they would be around forever.

Ha! said the universe. While those sites have had moments of instability, it has gotten really bad lately. It looks like Lycos has been dealing with a “server outage” since the beginning of the year.

The company that bought Lycos in 2018 is now having serious issues with financial hardships, lying to the Indian government about stock value and they just had a leadership change in mid-February. I can’t imagine getting 30 year old legacy website services back up and running is a high priority although there is a notice on the Lycos main page stating they are working on it.

So, my purpose in posting all this is to say that if you counted on any sites in those domains for anything - graphics, fan site stuff, whatever - you might want to check them! If they are down, keep checking because sites in each of the domains have been up intermittently. And, if you get lucky and are able to access the site, save it yourself or get a snapshot for the Wayback Machine!

Most of the sites that I have listed in my Linkware Websets I’ve copied with HTTrack but I’m sad about losing the sites I wasn’t able to capture.

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It blows my mind that either of those services still exist almost a quarter of a century after their peak usage.

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That is pretty much the general reaction of people - that’s still around?? What’s really wild is there are people out there who are still using Lycos for their email!

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When I was younger, I thought the way Angelfire would compartmentalize the sites into “neighborhoods” was clever: they’d only let in so many sites until one got full, and it seemed like it was more for keeping the backend organized. Knowing more about how those systems work, now it totally seems like it was just a confusing discoverability gimmick.

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Thanks for the heads up. I went and checked to confirm that there’s a copy of Ted’s Caving Page on the Wayback Machine.

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