Common Crawl, a Second Window Into Web History
The Wayback Machine is not the only public archive of the web. Learn what Common Crawl collects, how it differs, and when it helps your research.
Field guide to web evidence
Traffgate Review
A domain name is a signpost, not a source. Traffgate Review helps you separate what a name suggests from what can actually be verified.
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8 / 16On the workbench
One method per guide, each with the limit of what it proves.
What WHOIS and RDAP Still Show About a Domain
WHOIS is being phased out in favor of RDAP. Learn what registration data can still tell you about a domain, and what redaction and the protocol change have taken away.
What a Domain String Can and Cannot Prove
A domain name is a label, not a biography. Learn what you can and cannot infer from the string itself, and when to check the record.
How Top Level Domains Shape First Impressions
A practical guide to reading the suffix that follows the dot, from .com to country codes and brand domains, and what it can and cannot tell you.
Hyphens, Numbers, and Other Naming Signals
Can punctuation and digits hint at a domain’s origin? We explore patterns and limits.
Why Search Results Do Not Confirm a History
A search result can look like proof of a domain's past, but it often is not. Learn why search snippets are weak evidence and what to check instead.
Using the Wayback Machine as a Primary Source
A practical guide to finding and reading archived web pages, with attention to timestamps, missing captures, and context.
Reading a Snapshot in Its Original Context
A single archived page is not history. Learn the contextual checks that separate evidence from decoration.
Name Limits
What domain strings do and do not tell us about past or present activity.
What WHOIS and RDAP Still Show About a Domain
WHOIS is being phased out in favor of RDAP. Learn what registration data can still tell you about a domain, and what redaction and the protocol change have taken away.
What a Domain String Can and Cannot Prove
A domain name is a label, not a biography. Learn what you can and cannot infer from the string itself, and when to check the record.
How Top Level Domains Shape First Impressions
A practical guide to reading the suffix that follows the dot, from .com to country codes and brand domains, and what it can and cannot tell you.
Archive Craft
Practical methods for reading archived web material as historical evidence.
Common Crawl, a Second Window Into Web History
The Wayback Machine is not the only public archive of the web. Learn what Common Crawl collects, how it differs, and when it helps your research.
Using the Wayback Machine as a Primary Source
A practical guide to finding and reading archived web pages, with attention to timestamps, missing captures, and context.
Reading a Snapshot in Its Original Context
A single archived page is not history. Learn the contextual checks that separate evidence from decoration.
Publishing Ethics
How to start an editorial project without implying unverified continuity.
Building a New Brand on an Empty Archive
Starting a publication on a domain with no verifiable past raises real ethics questions. Here is how to be honest about a blank slate.
How to Avoid Implying False Continuity
New publications can accidentally seem like old projects. Learn wording, design, and ethical choices to prevent false continuity and build trust.
Making Corrections When the Record Is Thin
A practical guide for small publishers on issuing corrections when verifiable material is scarce. Learn ethical steps and tools.
Around the other shelves
A short list of independent sites covering research, archives and verification habits we find useful.
For anyone weighing a first glider flight in Britain, this site gathers plain-language notes on club culture and volunteer life, checklists for planning an initial visit, and sky literacy drawn from public weather and land observation.
Just for Today gathers plain-language notes on the Usui Reiki tradition, its history, its lineages and precepts, the shape of a session, the teaching degrees, and the quiet practice of meditation and grief, with the old DovenStar school archive cited as a documentary source.
The Intake Log documents how a Newark pregnancy help center works, from the walk-in front desk and free pregnancy testing to the choices presented, the partner's place in the conversation, and the after-visit records.
The Hinoki File reads like a sawmill ledger, covering hinoki, keyaki, kiri and Nikko sugi with their uses and limits, joinery from glue-free mortise and tenon to kanawa-tsugi and shrinking corners, and old houses.
The Season Book gathers the plays of Stages of Imagination, from The Dragon Singer to The Eagle's Claw, with full casts and illustrations for each production staged between 2000 and 2023.
The Homepage Gallery traces one Japanese author's daily life through a monthly journal kept from 2003 to 2007, yearly pages spanning 1990 to 2009, and seventy dated episodes.