So far most of the writing about surrounding new media have addressed the way society is engaging, adapting to, and changing at such a quick rate. In my belief, one would be hard pressed to find an individual that would disagree with this seemingly blatant observation. But any new study requires digging into the past and researching some part of the early stages that have led us to this point. George Marcus (whom David Gauntlett and Ross Horsley cite in their conclusion of chapter 3 of Web.Studies) "…[points] out that the very subject of our research is determined by the connections we make between objects, people and stories during our fieldwork" (Gauntlett and Horsley, 47). When we look at the Internet, we can see a running narrative of our collective history. Perhaps the Internet is filled with what some may claim is 'junk' or 'trash', but this data that is out there and simple because of that fact, it is part of our collective history.

Description

www.textfiles.com is the website we'll look at for this analysis. Years ago, I either stumbled upon this website or a friend directed me to it and was immediately intrigued. The layout is extremely simple and easy to follow. The background is black with the text green. This has remained constant throughout my familiarity with the site. Essentially, the site functions as an archive of the stages of the Internet, and as the domain implies, it exists mostly as a collection of text files. One of the more interesting aspects of this site is that an individual who feels it is important to keep a record of the early text files that were posted to the Internet especially in the 1980's and early 1990's maintains it.

"On the face of things, we seem to be merely talking about text-based files, containing only the letters of the English Alphabet (and the occasional punctuation mark).
On deeper inspection, of course, this isn't quite the case. What this site offers is a glimpse into the history of writers and artists bound by the 128 characters that the American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) allowed them. The focus is on mid-1980's text files and the world as it was then, but even these files are sometime retooled 1960s and 1970s works, and offshoots of this culture exist to this day".
-Jason Scott

Jason Scott, after overseeing this website for years hold the greatest authority when it comes to briefly describing the importance of archiving and keeping this record. It is meaningful to many people, especially those historians who wish to preserve then Internet as they remember it, and as they contributed to it.

The further one explores, the further one realizes how important this record or archive becomes. It is a history. It is our history. And as scholars of new media, these early files cannot be forgotten. This website is organized in an appropriate and user-friendly manner. It takes very little knowledge of surfing the Internet to become familiar with its layout. But there are also much more than just text files. There are audio files, BBS Lists, the Art Scene, etc which are also included. The actual text files are broken down into categories containing a wealth of the early communications on the web.

Analysis

So as this is an ultimately an analysis of a website, it is imperative that we treat it as a form of new media. We now have the capabilities to store massive volumes of information that are accessible from nearly all regions of the globe. This in its deepest sense is new media incarnate. Since all the text files as well as other types of files have been a collective contribution, David Weinberger accurately labels the result of the Internet as a direct "result [of a loose federation of documents- many small pieces loosely joined. But in what has turned out to be simply the first cultural artifact and structure of institution the Web has subtly subverted, the interior structure of documents has changed, not just the way they are connected to one another. The web has blown documents apart. It treats tightly bound volumes like a collection of ideas- none longer than can fit on a single screen -that the reader can consult in the order she or he wants, regardless of the author's intentions. It makes links beyond the documents covers an integral part of every document. What once was literally a tightly bound entity has been ripped into pieces and thrown into the air" ( Weinberger, 43). www.textfiles.com pieces together these 'lost' files.
This site is a near perfect example of another one of Weinberger's points, "…The Web is a mess, as organized as an orgy. It consists of voices proclaiming whatever they think is worth saying, trying on stances, experimenting with extremes, being wrong in public, making fun of what they hold sacred in their day jobs, linking themselves into permanent coalitions and drive-by arguments, savoring the rush you feel when you realize you don't have to be the way you've been" (Weinberger, 48).

Evaluation

It would be extremely preposterous to assume one could evaluate nearly any aspect of new media, especially websites with accuracy. The field is too new. But what one can do is evaluate for themselves, under the realization that this evaluation might be completely off center. Our class discussions have illustrated the point that new media is a new discipline, and open to individual interpretation. www.textfiles.com gives us an example of an archive of the importance of working with one another in the webbing community. It also shows a level of dedication of an individual (and those willing to mirror the site) to preserve history, which in the end, I believe will make the study of the prorgression of media easier for those of us that have not been introduced to media like the Internet since childhood.

Weinberger, David. "A New World (Small Pieces Loosely Joined)

Gauntlett, David and Ross Hosley. "Web.Studies 2nd Ed.