This appendix provides practical resources for instructors teaching Archaeobytology at any level. Includes:
Discussion prompts and facilitation guides
Assignment templates with rubrics
Lab exercises and technical tutorials
Datasets and case study materials
Assessment strategies
Guest speaker suggestions
Field trip and site visit ideas
Warm-Up Questions (5-10 minutes):
What's a platform or service you used that no longer exists? How did you feel when it shut down?
Do you still have access to content you created on dead platforms? Why or why not?
What digital artifacts from your life do you think will survive 50 years? Which won't?
Deep Discussion (30-45 minutes):
Is platform death inevitable, or can we design platforms that last centuries?
Who should be responsible for preserving digital culture—individuals, corporations, governments, or volunteers?
When GeoCities died, was it murder or natural death? What's the difference?
Facilitation Tips:
Start with personal stories (everyone has lost something)
Move from individual to systemic (why does this keep happening?)
End with agency (what can we do about it?)
Scenario-Based Discussion:
Present this scenario:
"You're designing a social network for activists in authoritarian countries. They need to organize protests, share information, and protect their identities. How do you embody the Three Pillars (Declaration, Connection, Ground) while keeping users safe?"
Discussion Questions:
What trade-offs exist between sovereignty and safety?
Can you have full Declaration (persistent identity) if anonymity is needed?
How do you design Connection (direct communication) that resists surveillance?
What does Ground (owned infrastructure) mean when users can't safely self-host?
Facilitation Tips:
Break into small groups (3-4 students) for 15 minutes
Have each group present their design
Compare approaches—no single right answer
Highlight tensions: sovereignty vs. usability, privacy vs. accountability
Dilemma-Based Discussion:
Present these scenarios and have students vote/debate:
Scenario 1: The Deleted Confession
A celebrity posts a racist tweet, then deletes it 10 minutes later. You have a screenshot. Should you archive it?
Scenario 2: The Teen's Blog
A 14-year-old wrote a blog in 2008 documenting coming out as gay. The blog is abandoned but still online. The person is now 30 and doesn't know it exists. Should you archive it?
Scenario 3: The Hate Forum
A white supremacist forum announces shutdown. It contains evidence of radicalization pathways that researchers could study. Should you archive it?
Discussion Framework:
Initial reactions (gut feelings)
Apply Custodial Filter (significance, fragility, feasibility, redundancy, ethics)
Compare reasoning (why do people disagree?)
Discuss: Can triage be "objective," or is it always value-laden?
Facilitation Tips:
Don't let discussion get abstract—keep returning to concrete harms/benefits
Acknowledge discomfort (these dilemmas are designed to be hard)
No "gotcha" answers—focus on reasoning quality, not "correct" conclusions
Learning Objectives:
Apply Archaeobyte Taxonomy to real platforms
Analyze causes of platform death
Evaluate preservation efforts
Assignment:
Choose a dead platform (GeoCities, Vine, Google+, MySpace, etc.). Write a 2,000-word "autopsy" analyzing:
Life History (500 words): When launched? Peak usage? Decline? Shutdown?
Cause of Death (500 words): Why did it die? (Financial failure, acquisition, competition, policy changes?)
Preservation Status (500 words): What was saved? By whom? What was lost?
Taxonomic Analysis (500 words): What state are artifacts in now? (Archaeobyte, Umbrabyte, Petribyte?) What should be done to improve preservation?
Rubric (100 points):
Historical accuracy (20 pts): Facts correct, timeline clear
Analysis depth (30 pts): Goes beyond surface description, identifies systemic causes
Taxonomy application (25 pts): Correctly applies Archaeobyte Taxonomy
Recommendations (15 pts): Actionable suggestions for preservation
Writing quality (10 pts): Clear, organized, properly cited
Resources to Provide:
List of 20 dead platforms students can choose from
Links to Internet Archive, Wikipedia, tech press coverage
Template outline
Learning Objectives:
Apply Custodial Filter to triage decisions
Navigate ethical dilemmas
Defend preservation choices
Assignment:
Scenario: You have 72 hours to archive a dying platform before shutdown. You have 1TB of storage and 5 volunteers. The platform has:
100,000 user accounts
10 million posts (text, images, videos)
500 communities
Mix of public and private content
Task: Write a 3,500-4,500 word triage plan including:
Assessment (750 words): Platform architecture, data types, scale, access patterns, technical barriers
Triage Matrix (1,000 words): Score 5-8 content types using Custodial Filter (significance, fragility, feasibility, redundancy, ethics). Create table with justifications.
Action Plan (1,000 words): What you'll save, in what order, using what methods. Include timeline.
Ethical Justification (750 words): Defend your choices. What did you leave behind? Why? What ethical dilemmas arose?
Rubric (100 points):
Custodial Filter application (30 pts): Systematic, well-justified scoring
Technical feasibility (20 pts): Plan is realistic given constraints
Ethical reasoning (25 pts): Acknowledges dilemmas, defends choices thoughtfully
Action plan (15 pts): Concrete, detailed, executable
Writing quality (10 pts)
Variations:
Change constraints (24 hours instead of 72, 100GB instead of 1TB)
Add complications (DMCA threats, server instability, volunteer dropout)
Different platform types (social network vs. forum vs. file-sharing)
Learning Objectives:
Design systems embodying Three Pillars
Integrate Archive and Anvil practices
Propose actionable implementation
Assignment:
Choose a current platform (Twitter, Instagram, Discord, etc.). Design a sovereign alternative that embodies the Three Pillars.
Deliverables:
Written Design Document (6,000-8,000 words):
Problem analysis (why is current platform inadequate?)
System design (architecture, technologies, features)
Three Pillars embodiment (how Declaration, Connection, Ground are achieved)
Governance model (who decides? how are disputes resolved?)
Business model (how is it sustained?)
Adoption strategy (how do you get users to switch?)
Implementation roadmap (Years 1-2, 3-5, 6-10)
Presentation (15 minutes + 10 min Q&A):
Slide deck (10-15 slides)
Live demo or mockup (if applicable)
Prototype or Artifact (choose one):
Technical MVP (working proof-of-concept)
Policy brief (model legislation)
Campaign plan (movement strategy)
Rubric (100 points):
Problem diagnosis (10 pts)
System design (25 pts): Technical feasibility, Three Pillars integrity
Governance/business model (15 pts): Sustainability, resistance to capture
Adoption strategy (15 pts): Realistic path to users
Integration (15 pts): Synthesizes Archive + Anvil, preservation + creation
Presentation (10 pts)
Prototype/artifact (10 pts)
Goal: Learn basic web scraping with wget
Prerequisites: Command line familiarity (or teach basics first)
Exercise:
Setup (15 min):
Install wget (or use online terminal)
Choose a simple static website (instructor provides list)
Basic Scrape (30 min):
wget --recursive --level=2 --wait=1 --random-wait [URL]
Explain each flag
Students scrape their chosen site
Analysis (30 min):
Examine downloaded files
What was captured? What was missed?
How big is the archive?
Can you browse it offline?
Ethics Discussion (30 min):
Was this ethical? (public site, robots.txt, rate limiting)
When is scraping okay vs. problematic?
What if site owner didn't consent?
Advanced Challenge (15 min, optional):
Scrape with custom user-agent
Exclude certain file types
Mirror with converted links
Instructor Notes:
Have backup sites ready (students' choices might be down)
Monitor for overly aggressive scraping (teach courtesy)
Emphasize robots.txt respect
Goal: Extract and analyze metadata from archived content
Tools: ExifTool, Python (or use GUI tools for less technical students)
Exercise:
Download Sample Dataset (10 min):
Instructor provides ZIP of 50 images from GeoCities archive
Students extract locally
Extract Metadata (30 min):
xxxxxxxxxx
exiftool -csv *.jpg > metadata.csv
Open in spreadsheet
What information is embedded? (dates, camera models, GPS, software)
Analysis (45 min):
When were these images created?
What tools were used?
Can you infer anything about creators?
What's missing? (names, context, meaning)
Curation Exercise (30 min):
Create a simple database (Google Sheets or Airtable)
Add columns: Title, Creator (unknown), Date, Description, Tags
Fill in what you can infer
Identify what needs research
Reflection (15 min):
How does metadata help/hurt preservation?
Privacy concerns? (GPS coordinates, personal info)
How do you fill gaps when metadata is missing?
Goal: Run obsolete software/media using emulation
Tools: Flashpoint (Flash games), DOSBox (old PC games), or Internet Archive's emulation
Exercise:
Choose Platform (15 min):
Flash game, DOS game, or old Mac software
Instructor provides curated list
Set Up Emulator (30 min):
Install/configure emulator
Load software
Get it running
Experience (30 min):
Play the game / use the software
Take notes on experience
Screenshot interesting moments
Technical Analysis (30 min):
What had to be emulated? (hardware, OS, libraries)
What works perfectly? What's broken?
Is this "authentic" to original experience?
Preservation Discussion (15 min):
How do you preserve the emulator itself?
What if emulator becomes obsolete?
Is emulation always the right approach?
Advanced Challenge:
Detailed rubrics for each assignment available in the comprehensive Instructor's Guide
Adapt to your institution's learning outcomes
1. GeoCities Sample (50MB)
100 GeoCities homepages (HTML, images, GIFs)
Representative of different "neighborhoods"
Cleared for educational use
Use for: Curation exercises, metadata practice, web archaeology
2. Vine Archive Sample (100 videos, 2GB)
Curated selection from Internet Archive
Mix of viral hits and obscure creators
Includes metadata (usernames, dates, loop counts)
Use for: Taxonomy classification, significance assessment
3. Deleted Tweet Database (CSV, 5MB)
1,000 deleted tweets from public figures (2015-2023)
Includes: original text, timestamp, reason deleted (if known), archival status
Use for: Ethics discussions, triage simulations
4. Platform Death Timeline (Spreadsheet)
200+ platform shutdowns (1995-2025)
Fields: Name, launch date, shutdown date, reason, preservation status
Use for: Pattern analysis, historical research
5. Forum Archive Sample (SQL dump, 50MB)
Small phpBB forum (10 years of posts)
Anonymized usernames
Use for: Database exploration, community analysis
Instructor Note: Email the course administrator for access links.
Each packet includes:
GeoCities Rescue (2009)
Timeline of shutdown announcement → rescue → archiving
Archive Team IRC logs (excerpts)
Technical documentation of scraping methods
Statistics (sites saved, data volume)
Reflections from participants
Teaching Uses: Crisis triage, volunteer coordination, technical methods
Tumblr NSFW Purge (2018)
Company announcement and justification
Community response (protests, exodus)
What was deleted vs. saved
Ethical debates among archivists
Teaching Uses: Content moderation ethics, LGBTQ+ preservation, consent
Mastodon's Growing Pains (2016-2024)
Federation architecture
Moderation challenges (defederation, Nazi instances)
Technical issues (scaling, UX)
Comparison to Twitter
Teaching Uses: Distributed commons, governance, Three Pillars application
Weekly Reflection Journal:
Students write 300 words each week on assigned readings
Prompts: "What surprised you?" "What challenged your thinking?" "What questions remain?"
Graded credit/no-credit (did they engage thoughtfully?)
In-Class Quizzes:
5-10 questions at start of class
Multiple choice or short answer
Check understanding of readings
Allows missed classes (drop 2 lowest scores)
Participation Rubric:
Rate students on: Preparation (did they do readings?), Contribution (do they speak up?), Listening (do they engage with others' ideas?)
Self-assessment + peer assessment + instructor assessment
Worth 10-15% of grade
Midterm: Written Exam (90 minutes)
Part 1: Definitions (20 pts) - Define 10 key terms (Archaeobyte, Custodial Filter, Three Pillars, etc.)
Part 2: Short Answer (30 pts) - 3 questions requiring 1-paragraph answers
Part 3: Essay (50 pts) - Choose 1 of 3 prompts, write 3-5 pages
Example Essay Prompts:
"Compare and contrast the Archive and the Anvil. Why are both necessary?"
"Apply the Custodial Filter to a real platform shutdown. Justify your triage decisions."
"Design a sovereign alternative to [platform]. How does it embody the Three Pillars?"
Final: Portfolio + Presentation
Portfolio (70%): Collection of revised assignments + reflective essay on learning
Presentation (30%): 10-minute presentation of capstone project or best work
Alternative: Open-Book Take-Home Exam
48 hours to complete
3-5 essay questions
Allows research, synthesis, deeper thinking
Good for upper-level/graduate courses
Archivists and Preservationists:
Internet Archive staff (Wayback Machine engineers, digital librarians)
Archive Team members (guerrilla archivists)
Library of Congress web archivists
Museum digital curators (Strong Museum, Smithsonian)
Builders and Technologists:
Mastodon developers (Eugen Rochko or instance admins)
IndieWeb advocates (Tantek Çelik, others)
Open-source maintainers (WordPress, Ghost, Nextcloud)
Protocol designers (ActivityPub, Matrix, IPFS teams)
Scholars:
Digital historians studying platform death
Media archaeologists theorizing dead media
STS scholars analyzing platform power
Legal scholars on copyright and digital rights
Activists:
EFF staff (Cory Doctorow, if available!)
Right-to-repair advocates
Data privacy activists
Platform accountability organizers
Hybrid Format (works for remote or in-person):
Talk (30 min): Speaker presents their work
Q&A (20 min): Students ask questions
Small Group Discussion (20 min): Students discuss in breakouts, speaker rotates
Reflection (10 min): Debrief as full class
Student Preparation:
Assign 1-2 readings by/about speaker
Have students submit questions in advance
Designate student discussion leader
If Near San Francisco:
Internet Archive Headquarters: Tour data centers, meet staff, see book scanning
Computer History Museum: Exhibits on early computing, preservation methods
If Near Boston:
MIT Media Lab or Berkman Klein Center: Digital rights research centers
If Near Washington DC:
Library of Congress: Web archiving division tour
Smithsonian: Digital preservation labs
If Near New York:
Museum of the Moving Image: Video game preservation
Internet Archive Virtual Tour:
Pre-recorded or live Zoom tour
Students submit questions in chat
Follow-up assignment: Explore Wayback Machine, find interesting artifacts
Platform Shutdown Retrospective:
Watch documentaries (if available) on GeoCities, MySpace, Vine
Analyze what went wrong
Discuss preservation efforts
Live Excavation:
If a platform announces shutdown during your course (rare but exciting!):
Follow Archive Team's IRC channels in real-time
Participate in rescue efforts (if appropriate)
Document the experience
Reflect on triage decisions
Students without coding experience:
Provide GUI alternatives (ArchiveBox instead of command-line scrapers)
Pair technical/non-technical students
Offer optional "coding bootcamp" sessions
Students with limited tech access:
Lab time should not require personal laptops
Provide virtual machines or cloud environments
Record technical demos for review
Students with reading disabilities:
Provide audiobook versions or text-to-speech readings where possible
Allow extended time for reading assignments
Offer alternative formats (videos, podcasts) when available
Multiple means of engagement: Lectures + discussions + labs + guest speakers
Multiple means of representation: Text + video + hands-on + case studies
Multiple means of action: Papers + presentations + code + creative projects
Student complaint: "Why are we criticizing platforms? I like Facebook."
Response:
Acknowledge: "It's okay to use platforms. I use them too."
Clarify: "We're analyzing power structures, not telling you what to use."
Refocus: "The question isn't 'is Facebook bad,' but 'what happens when platforms have unchecked power?' Think critically, make informed choices."
Student complaint: "I'm a humanities major. I can't code."
Response:
Reassure: "You don't need to be a programmer. You need to understand what's possible."
Offer support: "Office hours, peer tutoring, optional coding workshops available."
Reframe: "Archaeobytology is humanities + tech. Your perspective as a humanist is valuable."
Student complaint: "Who cares about old websites?"
Response:
Connect to their life: "Have you ever lost photos, messages, content you created? How did that feel?"
Scale up: "Now imagine losing the entire cultural history of an era. That's what's at stake."
Show impact: "Laws, organizations, careers are being built around this. It's a real, growing field."
Problem: Students can't get software running.
Solutions:
Test all tools before class on multiple OS (Windows, Mac, Linux)
Have backup plan (cloud-based tools, instructor's machine + screen share)
Pair students (troubleshooting partner)
Build in extra time (labs always take longer than planned)
ADHO (Alliance of Digital Humanities Organizations): Teaching DH resources applicable to Archaeobytology
Archive Team IRC/Discord: Real-time archiving community (lurk to learn)
IndieWeb Forums: Discussions on sovereignty and decentralization
Humanist Discussion Group: Digital humanities pedagogy
Code4Lib: Technical archiving community
SAA (Society of American Archivists): Preservation methods
"Teaching Digital Humanities" (various collections) - Many strategies adapt to Archaeobytology
"Critical Digital Pedagogy" - Integrating activism and scholarship
"Making Things and Drawing Boundaries" - On interdisciplinary teaching
Teaching Archaeobytology is challenging because it's new, interdisciplinary, and politically engaged. But that's also what makes it exciting.
Key Principles:
Balance theory and practice: Don't just read about scraping—actually scrape
Embrace ethical complexity: Triage dilemmas have no easy answers
Connect to students' lives: Everyone has lost digital artifacts
Build community: Students should leave feeling part of a movement
Stay current: Platforms die regularly—incorporate breaking news
You're not just teaching a subject—you're forming a discipline. Every student who takes your course becomes part of the emerging Archaeobytology community.
End of Appendix D
Next: Appendix E — Professional Resources