Rural Revolution Disappearance?

Screenshot of the Wayback Machine

(Update at the end of this post)

A reader (thanks Sara!) emailed me with the chilling information that Patrice Lewis' blog, Rural-Revolution) has disappeared off of the internet. I don't have Patrice's phone number but I will send her an email in a bit.

My first move, after verifying the site was redirected, was to check the WayBack Machine and start archiving her website for her in case she didn't have a backup. To my surprise, the WayBack Machine has deleted all her information! I have never seen this happen before. I built websites back in the 90's and those sites are still on the WB Machine. It serves as a snapshot in time of just about every website on the internet...except Patrice's.

Usually this type of thing happen because the website owner failed to set up an auto-renewal on the domain name. In cases like Patrice's, once a website becomes popular, there are squatters, or people that put orders in to buy a domain name in the case that it is not auto-renewed. As soon as the domain name becomes available, the squatter snatches it up and uses the traffic-attracting domain name for their own gain.

Typical blank splash "holding" page until renewal or resold.

A good place to search the status and history a domain name is Whois.sc. That is where I see that Rural-Revolution.com expired on Aug 9, 2013. I hope it isn't too late for her. I ran over and bought the .net and .org just in case she needs it. I sent her an email suggesting she renew her domain name immediately. Usually there is a 24-48 window to renew past your deadline. The generic splash page that is showing indicates to me that it is most likely in a holding pattern until she either renews or a squatter gets it.

WhoIs.sc tells the chilling details

In the meantime, I'm going to search the depths of the internet for a source to backup her old posts just in case.

~OJD

Update: 17:35 MST

Patrice is indeed aware of the issue. The problem lies between her and Google. My hypothesis about her domain name was correct and she was aware of it before it expired. Her Google login has not been allowing her entry and therefore she cannot update her domain information. She is working on it but offers her original URL in the meantime:

http://www.patricelewis.blogspot.com/

Her feedburner account seems to be working and that is how I found her latest post:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/RuralRevolution

I suggest using bookmarking both addresses.

~OJD