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Follow the updates! Reconstructing past practices with web archive data

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Paßmann, Johannes, Gerzen, Lisa·2024·Internet Histories
DOI 10.1080/24701475.2024.2310405
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Abstract

The article argues that data from web archives can help to reconstruct past practices: Drawing on the example of practices of online commenting, it shows that even though practices themselves are not archivable, artifacts with specific relations to these practices remain.Identifying relevant updates of these artifacts, following them beyond the archive and making them non-human research participants in a technographic sense, allows us to not only decentre web archives as dominant data source, but also to benefit from their richness as archives of artifacts.We situate this potential in a larger context of practice theory and explain our own approach of using web archive data, combining them with interviews and developing software to triangulate both with one another.

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  • Triangulation allows the study to contextualize gaps and inconsistencies in the archived record while strengthening the reliability of historical interpretation.

    “This triangulation allows the study to contextualize gaps and inconsistencies in the archived record while strengthening the reliability of historical interpretation (Paßmann and Gerzen, 2024).”

    From Google Arts & Culture and the platformization of cultural heritage: Convergence, gamification, and shifting positions of institutional partners (2026) · cites this paper as Paßmann and Gerzen, 2024

    Section 4.1 describes investigating gaps in archive data, and Section 4.3 says triangulating web archive data with interviews yielded richer information for reconstructing past practices. The paper does not specifically show that triangulation contextualizes inconsistencies in the archived record or establishes the reliability of the resulting historical interpretation. (LLM, conf=0.82)

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Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Paßmann, J., & Gerzen, L.
Affiliations
Ruhr University Bochum (DE)
Corresponding author
Paßmann, Johannes
ORCID
Venue
Internet Histories
Publisher
Informa UK Limited
Published
2024-02-05
Volume
8
Issue
3
Pages
213-228
ISSN
  • 2470-1475 (ISSN-L)
  • 2470-1483
DOI
10.1080/24701475.2024.2310405
OpenAlex
W4391569536
Cited by
3
References
2
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2024: 1
FWCI
8.52
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
Internet Histories (publishedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (438577023)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Conservation › Digital and Traditional Archives Management
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Data Analysis and Archiving
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Literature and Literary Theory › Digital Humanities and Scholarship
Keywords
web archives, online commenting, practice theory, technography, triangulation of data sources, software tools, internet history

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