How Websites Die

It's been interesting to see how websites die - from domain parking pages to timeouts to blank pages to outdated TLS cipher errors, there are a multitude of different ways. Tied for the most common are two very different modalities: the opportunistic vultures of domain parking pages, and the natural cycle of life and death: a new website, unconnected from what was once there by everything except name. Vox.com, now a popular news website, was once a blogging platform. Spam website were also common, most disguised as "News" websites, although some pretended to be products, hoping that visitors wouldn't notice that there was no way to actually buy any of the services advertised. A couple of the websites were simply frozen in time - no longer allowing signups, but with no obvious indication that they'd closed down other than a copyright date a few years old. Trying to keep websites around forever is struggling against the nature of the web. I've often thought about getting together with some friends to pay into a fund to house our websites after we die.