back2roots.org .. gone??

[Legerdemain]

It is at times like these I wouldn't mind having had someone downloaded the entire site, just in case. I know that most sites do their best to keep their bandwidth low and this by using bot-tracking applications and so on (sometimes when I had donwloaded more than 3-4 files in a row from Back2Roots I was left out in the cold for a while since the site believed I was a bot). But, it so often happens with sites that all that one is left with in the end, if shutdown, is Wayback Machine... and I hate it.

Even though I've always enjoyed Back2Root and their efforts, I've come to seldom use it today since the games hosted are in most cases the cracked ones which often works so-so with WHDLoad. If IPF were aimed at, so much the better even though it would be hard to manage to get the games written back to disk for those who would want to do that. But, anyways, the point is, if gone for good it would be a site which I would miss, although rarely visited.

In fact, I've come to the conclusion that I hate most things hosted on the web, since the web in most cases only is a temporary way of storing things. Hall Of Light, for example, I wouldn't mind paying the authors like €50, or maybe even a little bit more, to have on a DVD with the entire site just to ensure that I won't wake up one day not being able to access the site ever again. People ALWAYS get fed up developing sites, and for some reason they seldom want to hand over their work to someone else for continued support, and in most cases they don't want to sell their work either, which leaves nothing at all to the public in the end. I can fully understand people who tries to download entire sites, because if they don't, chances are the sites will be lost forever at one point or another.

It is a bit like emulation. If the emulation scene hadn't come up with the GoodTools (no matter how much I hate those damn GoodTools and their bad dumps, their alternative dumps and their overdumps and all the people obsessed with obtaining all the roms just for the sake of it, not caring about legality or whatever), and the applications alike, how many games wouldn't have been lost in the sands of time? Now prototypes, really hard to get hold of releases and only god knows what have been preserved for the future. This would never have happened if it wasn't for the sake of the emulation scene. The companies themselves would have, with time, lost the sources to some of the games and eventually not having had been able to offer the games to the public in any way, commercial or not. It not for no reason at all C.A.P.S. started back in the days. Or others doing the same thing as C.A.P.S. does (Yes, I do know they've changed their name now).

Oh.

Well.

Anyways.

[Legerdemain]

Like I said earlier, this is one of the reasons I dislike the internet... sites that are getting way too big and way too important might just disappear, especially annoying, it is, when they don't offer some kind of alternative way of downloading "all" the material on the site (like P2P, or with torrents just like OverclockedRemix offers where you can download their entire collection of hosted remixes).

I would cry me a river if Hall Of Light were to disappear. I would cry me a river if Exotica were to disappear. I would cry me a river if many other sites were to disappear, and I constantly have this fear of sites that I care for might disappear one day... and Back2Roots did. Everything feels so extremely temporary, and I FULLY understand people that wants to download all the material there is to be found on certain sites... because the next day it might all be gone. When sites disappear it is all so final. If a magazine stops being produced, all that they have done is still available in one form or another, and can legally be bought... all the written reviews, all the presented maps and solutions, everything, is still there. But with a site, it is all gone. Imagine GameFAQ's closing down. Imagine ALL the manhours spent on the material that is to be found on that site... gone... or at least shattered (in some cases, to reappear on some various sites).

Why on earth can't Back2Roots announce why they are offline? What is the problem? Do they tend to resolve the problem (if there is a problem) or do they just not care about the site anymore? If, when, why, what (courtesy of the Pet Shop Boys)? The silence will certainly not help them to keep their userbase (if they tend to return). A simple announcement would be enough, but as of today... nothing?

Oh, well, whatever...

I can live without Back2Roots, but it was a really nice site anyways... and it is a shame that it does seem to be gone, and especially a shame not knowing why...

Shame on them...

Shame...