The Web in Amber:  How the Ephemeral Human Digital Experience is Preserved and Analyzed

1. Abstract

For more than two decades, libraries, universities, archives, non-profits, and other cultural heritage institutions have been archiving the evolution of human society, government, and culture now ephemerally published on the Web. Through domain harvests, collections developed around themes or events, or simply necessity of institutional record, these organizations have built archives of enormous size and richness.

The aim of our panel is to demonstrate how web archives are being used in digital humanities research, including novel approaches to access, analytical tools, machine learning and social media archiving. We also show the importance of community building, collaborations with heritage institutions and offering web archives as one of many resources available to DH researchers – all of which helps bridge the gap between potential and use.