Shirky.com is gone
I read this essay in 2003 and it influenced how my business partner and I built our startup. It influenced what possibilities we chased after. But Shirky.com is now off-line:<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.shirky.com&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.shirky.com&#x2F;</a><p>I&#x27;m not sure when this happened but I see that Wikipedia has adjusted to this and now links to the archive.org link:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Clay_Shirky" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Clay_Shirky</a><p>This is yet another example of the history of the early Web disappearing. Shirky&#x27;s early essays were fundamental to way we understood the potential of the Web back in 1999-2008.<p>I actually discovered this while looking for another old Shirky essay which, as far as I can tell, is now entirely gone from the Web.