Gemini Archiving and WARC

[Brian Evans]

I can appreciate the instinct to archive, but I fall into the camp that 
would generally prefer that it not be done (while respecting that with
the way the technology is built, there is not a reasonable way to
prevent it).

I think a great tragedy of the internet is the inability to be forgotten
and to retract and change and not have your past mistakes dictate
your present. I dont have a technical solution for that in gemini, or
for that matter in gopher... but think that community norms and
expectations should develop around it organically (which is of
taking place currently in this discussion and will continue to do
so over time). I definitely support the commons for articles,
information, and "knowledge"... but hesitate to extend that to what
are sometimes the only personal outlets that some people may have.

I think if something like `robots.txt` were to be used for this
purpose I would recommend doing it at the directory level (and thus
break from how robots.txt works). In gemini many (most?) users are a
part of multiuser systems. If `robots.txt` at the root were used it 
would generally control the whole domain and not allow for
individual users to opt in or out. To that, I would also put in a vote for
an opt-in system rather than an opt-out system (like robots.txt). Opt-in
empowers all users to make choices whereas opt-out is often limited
to those that know to do so and have the technical know how to do
so.

There are also environmental and energy arguments against full
protocol archiving, though those costs may be small while gemini is
at or around its current size.

Anyway, just a few thoughts.