Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Internet The steady increase in number of broken hyperlinks as webpages are moved or removed.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

link +‎ rot

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Examples

  • Waxy. filthy light thief: Jakob Neilsen coined the term linkrot broadly as links that originally worked but are now broken.

    MetaFilter Korou 2008

  • I wrote about linkrot and the problems with online permanence back in August.

    Linkrot on Steroids: The Problems with URL Shorteners : Edward Champion’s Reluctant Habits 2009

  • Our cavalier refusal to ask these questions only exacerbates the problem of linkrot.

    Linkrot on Steroids: The Problems with URL Shorteners : Edward Champion’s Reluctant Habits 2009

  • July 22, 2005 10: 34 robotanders: skritchy, linkrot? where? the links in the post work for me.

    but i like pandas (Music (For Robots)) 2005

  • One ironic example of linkrot in the Canadian legal context is the disappearance of two major government-sponsored reports on the promising role that the Internet will play in Canadian economic and cultural survival.

    Linkrot and Legal Research — Slaw 2005

  • Further to an earlier post I made on SLAW on the topic of linkrot [1] i.e., the problem of references in scholarly publications to websites that no longer have valid URLs, the current edition of the Law Library Journal [2] from the American Association of Law Libraries [3] also has a nice article on the topic of linkrot – see:

    Slaw » More on linkrot » Print 2005

  • One ironic example of linkrot in the Canadian legal context is the disappearance of two major government-sponsored reports on the promising role that the Internet will play in Canadian economic and cultural survival.

    Slaw » Linkrot and Legal Research » Print 2005

  • Further to an earlier post I made on SLAW on the topic of linkrot i.e., the problem of references in scholarly publications to websites that no longer have valid URLs, the current edition of the Law Library Journal from the American Association of Law Libraries also has a nice article on the topic of linkrot – see:

    More on linkrot — Slaw 2005

  • When web pages have a half life of only two years on average, the problem of linkrot means that a lot of information on public websites may well not be there several years in the future Wallace Koehler, “Keeping the Web Garden Weeded: Managing the Elusive URLâ€?

    Slaw » Linkrot and Legal Research » Print 2005

  • Further to an earlier post I made on SLAW on the topic of linkrot i.e., the problem of references in scholarly publications to websites that no longer have valid URLs, the current edition of the Law Library Journal from the American Association of Law Libraries also has a nice article on the topic of linkrot – see:

    More on linkrot — Slaw 2005

Comments

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  • Joshua's Blog: '...And the long-term archivability of the hyperlink now depends on the health of a third party. The shortener may decide a link is a Terms Of Service violation and delete it. If the shortener accidentally erases a database, forgets to renew its domain, or just disappears, the link will break. If a top-level domain changes its policy on commercial use, the link will break... The most likely outcome, of course, is that we don't do anything and that the great linkrot apocalypse causes all of modern culture to dissapear in a puff of smoke. Hopefully.'

    April 13, 2009