The end of an era; Geocities flys the coop...

[Noct]

Wow; I just got a notice that effective Oct.26, GeoCities is shutting down for good.

I can't recall the last time I was even on Geos (and I certainly have no use for my own page whatsoever now), but this is still a bit "nostalgically stunning" to me.

In the current world of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, it seems irrelevant, but the early 90s internet would not have been what it was without Geos and Angelfire...

Despite being responsible for hosting thousands of dripping blood bars and flashing skull eye gifs, Geos is a foundation of the internet as far as I’m concerned. The net is obviously driven by user content, and Geos provided us all a way to get ours out there at a time when it was much more difficult to do so.

I can speak for myself and several other developers I know when I say, I really wouldn't be where I am today without them. I have no desire to go back to "developing" web pages in Geo's online text editor, but thank the lord it was there at the time.

Cya Geos, you will be missed.

[asf8]

Well written post Noct. It is an end of an era for sure. Maybe someday GeoCitie websites with all their animated gif goodness will come back out of the internets rusted past as the Duesenberg's of the internet. Or maybe not. :-)

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2350024,00.asp
Yahoo is the current proprietor of the site, a business they purchased in the late 90s for nearly $3.6 billion. Seriously, what were they thinking?

Not all bad for them. :p

[Noct]

Hah, that's amazing, I had no idea they paid that much for it.
I have a deep love for Geos, but it is based strictly in nostalgia. Even I recognize that there was never anything there of value outside of the ads we all ignored...

Apparently this news has been out there for a few weeks now, but I just happened upon it myself today. Whats amazing to me is how forgotten Geos has already become.

I mentioned it to a younger office guy here (not a dev), and he had never even heard of it. Then I mentioned it to a web developer and he had a similar reaction to mine... "You can't have the internet without Geocites!"

[wvxvw]

Well, I'm sorry to tell that, but it is also a fact that Geocities hosts lots of spam-senders, porn and all other sorts of internet junk that needs a temporary near-anonymous domain / domain name...
Or, as you say, have hosted...

[asf8]

Well, I'm sorry to tell that, but it is also a fact that Geocities hosts lots of spam-senders, porn and all other sorts of internet junk

Do you suppose they will all upgrade to Yahoo! Web Hosting then. :p

[Noct]

Well, I'm sorry to tell that, but it is also a fact that Geocities hosts lots of spam-senders, porn and all other sorts of internet junk that needs a temporary near-anonymous domain / domain name...
Or, as you say, have hosted...
Oh, well I'm sure if we get rid of Geos, that will all go away. :rolleyes:
Heh, seriously though, I'm not debating that there was ever anything of real value there, mostly just cheesy personal web sites and awful fan pages, but regardless, it was a very important part of the early internet IMHO...
Do you suppose they will all upgrade to Yahoo! Web Hosting then. :p
Hah, yeah, as if... Funny as that is, I'd bet that's the basic business strategy behind it; I just hope that they aren't actually naive enough to think that the people using free Geos accounts are gonna pay for hosting.

[wvxvw]

That's what I was usually telling my mum when she wanted me to clean the room... it's going to be a mess in a less then a day anyway -- so, why bother to clean it at all? :)

Now, honestly, Geocities stopped being what they ware meant to be years ago... and they ware only accumulating dirt of all kinds... I think that the first piece of HTML I've ever written was hosted there too... in 1999 :) So, I to feel sorry for them, a bit...

[Jesse]

Yes, in my time I had a geo page or two. I even made one dedicated to a girlfriend as an aniversary gift. Good thing it's nowhere to be found online :)

[tg]

Yes, in my time I had a geo page or two. I even made one dedicated to a girlfriend as an aniversary gift. Good thing it's nowhere to be found online :)

oh shit jesse... you just made me spit coffee.

[Noct]

Yes, in my time I had a geo page or two. I even made one dedicated to a girlfriend as an aniversary gift. Good thing it's nowhere to be found online :)
Hah!
Love it, I did the exact same thing, cept mine was to smooth over a fight.

Don't be so sure it's gone though; it's startling what you find on the internet way back machine. My original page is still on there, albeit with no images (thankfully)...