Cool URIs Don't Change (1998)

📝 Discussion Summary (Click to expand)

1. Persistent URIs matter

"This keeps getting more credible as it ages. Now it's been at the same URI for 28 years." – zibw

2. Technical safeguards (redirects, canonical links, DOIs)

"What this page doesn't mention is 301 or 302 redirects. SEO has made “old URLs staying live” more of a widespread concern..." – firasd

3. Corporate URL churn breaks references

"Microsoft has a terrible habit of doing that. KB's used to have a predicable URL, they may again, but they keep changing them." – sghiassy

🚀 Project Ideas

Generating project ideas…

Provides a hosted service that registers and resolves permanent URIs using a decentralized registry, preventing link rot.
Solves persistent frustration of disappearing URLs and broken redirects.

Key	Value
Target Audience	Developers, content managers, publishers
Core Feature	Permanent URL registration & auto‑redirect with SLA‑backed uptime
Tech Stack	Node.js backend, PostgreSQL, IPFS for storage, GraphQL API
Difficulty	Medium
Monetization	Revenue-ready: subscription $5/mo per 1k URLs

HN users repeatedly cite broken links as a major pain point (e.g., “entropy”, “urls vanish fast”).
Could integrate with CI pipelines and static site generators for pre‑flight checks.

Generates future‑proof URIs that embed hierarchical context and timestamps, ensuring longevity.
Addresses the need for stable address spaces discussed in DOI and W3C examples.

Key	Value
Target Audience	Researchers, archivists, CMS builders
Core Feature	URI schema generator with date‑based sub‑paths and immutable identifiers
Tech Stack	Python library, SQLite, OpenAPI spec
Difficulty	Low
Monetization	Hobby

Quote from discussion: “A reason for using a topic area as part of the URI is that responsibility for sub‑parts of a URI space is typically delegated…”.
Would let HN commenters create URLs that survive reorganizations and CMS migrations.

Browser extension + API that auto‑audits external links on a page and archives them via WARC.
Tackles the everyday frustration of links disappearing after site redesigns.

Key	Value
Target Audience	Bloggers, educators, technical writers
Core Feature	Real‑time link health monitoring with automatic archival on 404
Tech Stack	React frontend, Python FastAPI, Wayback Machine API, WARC storage
Difficulty	Medium
Monetization	Revenue-ready: freemium with $0.01 per archived page

Commenters mention using plugins to check bookmarked links and the annoyance of “average time of url is 5 years”.
Valuable for preserving citations in academic and government reference contexts.