PRAGMATISM OF INTERNET ARCHIVES WITH REFERENCE TO REFERENCE ROT AND LINK ROT THREAT: A STUDY OF LIS JOURNALS
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.34256/Keywords:
HTTP errors, Link rot, Reference Rot-LIS JournalsAbstract
This study analysed the deterioration and recovery of URL references from 83 research papers published in two DOAJ-indexed LIS journals between 2015 and 2017. Out of 2,237 total references, 721 (32.23%) contained URLs. The initial analysis found that 36.19% of these URLs were inactive (suffering from link rot), while 63.81% were accessible. The authors used the WebFX HTTP status checker to diagnose errors and then employed the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine to recover the missing web pages. This process was highly successful, increasing the number of accessible URLs from 460 (63.80%) to 584 (80.99%), a net gain of 17.19%. The paper also discusses the causes of URL rot, the associated HTTP error codes, and underscores the critical importance of web archives in preserving digital content and combating reference rot.
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