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+--- Thema: So why bother preserving them? (/showthread.php?tid=9784)
So why bother preserving them? - Shakibkhan92 - 17.11.2025
he prolific Apple II preservationist “4am” gave a great answer in Paleotronic magazine: This was how we taught math and science and grammar and history to an entire generation of children. That seems like something worth saving.”
That’s certainly true of Kirschen’s work.
In the Apple II games he made with Gesher, we see Jewish educators’ early steps learning to use a new medium to reach kids. And Kirschen’s later work with “artificial personalities” and “artificial creativity” foreshadows the promise and pitfalls of today’s AI craze. I’m glad to have played a part in bringing this software back to life so others can have the opportunity to play it and study it.
About the author
Josh Renaud is a journalist at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. He telemarketing data publishes computer history research on his website, Break Into Chat. He is interested in recovering lost or obscure software, and telling the stories of the people who made and used it. In 2024 he received a Geffen and Lewyn Family Southern Jewish Research Fellowship from Emory University to study papers related to Gesher’s educational computer games.
Inside the Internet Archive’s San
Francisco headquarters, you’ll find racks of servers preserving humanity’s digital memory — from old websites to disappearing government data, books to historic videotapes. We are a digital library for our times — and hopefully, for all times,” says Mark Graham, director of the Wayback Machine.
But preserving access to information
isn’t always easy. From political pressure to digital vanishing acts, the work of saving knowledge requires both care and courage. In a time when websites can be taken down overnight — from climate change pages to stories celebrating diversity — the Wayback Machine ensures they’re not lost forever. Former Air Force engineer Jessica Peterson, whose achievements were erased from the live web:
I didn’t know [the Wayback Machine] existed… It gave me some relief.” Whether you’re a researcher, student, journalist, or citizen — our goal is the same:
Universal access to all knowledge.