Magzalez’s eyes on media

Ya know, I had a bad feeling when I heard that Nintendo Power was moving from an in-house Nintendo publisher to Future U.S., Inc. But, I gave the new publisher a chance because I knew that it was one of the leading companies in its field.

But when the first issue from the new publisher came out, I knew that there was a turn for the worse ahead. Just like every newspaper and magazine, NP had a very distinct voice–funny, sarcastic, witty, whimsical. And from the first issue under Future U.S., NP got a bad case of laryngitis that I don’t think it’ll recover from any time soon.

Still, there were perks to the new move. For example, one more issue a year. And it was a good issue–a holiday issue. It brought a reprise to some reviews as well as lists of games for every type of gamer. I love lists.

Then there was the third issue by [No] Future U.S., which I never got, and that sent me into a spiral of depression and anxiety.

But what really put me over the top with this whole situation is the Nintendo Power Web site…or lack of Web site. If we step into the Wayback Machine, you could see what I mean.

• Nintendo Power: Aug. 11, 2007
• Nintendo Power: Today

“…we have very exciting plans for a bigger and better NintendoPower.com.” That is exactly what the Web site says and exactly what the first address from the new editor said in the first new string of issues. I don’t see it, and I’m starting to wonder if I ever will.

I miss the real Nintendo Power.

The Internet Archive is a non-profit organization based out of San Francisco. Their goal is to create a library of Web pages in order to better archive the goings on of the Internet and offer a permanent database of Web sites for researchers and historians.

I made good use of The Wayback Machine (The WBM) recently while doing research for a project in my media ethics class. I am writing a case study about a student journalist at Central Connecticut State University. In February, John Petroski, the opinions editor of CCSU’s student-run newspaper The Recorder, wrote an opinion piece titled “Rape only hurts if you fight it.” His satire did not go over well, and he eventually resigned from his position at the newspaper.

The newspaper currently has no contact information for Petroski. But, with a little help from The WBM, I was able to navigate back in time to The Recorder’s Web site just before Petroski left the paper. I found his contact information and continued from there.

It would have been a lot more difficult to find this information without this archive. It has other uses as well; check out what The New York Times was saying on Sept. 11, 2001.