[Organizers] Query: Tools to search for stale links (was Re: is NEFFA LinkFest still active)

[James Saxe via Organizers]

On Apr 26, 2017, at 1:33 PM, Jack Mitchell <jmitchell.nc at gmail.com> wrote:

> There is an extension for Chrome that will go through and check links for a particular page.  
> https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/link-checker/aibjbgmpmnidnmagaefhmcjhadpffaoi 
> 
> I ran it on the NEFFA Link Fest and this is what I got (or at least is the first screen): 
> Purple is sites that couldn't be reached, and red is not found messages of various types.

Thanks for this information, Jack.

The screenshot in Jack's message shows part of the page

     http://www.neffa.org/Top/Festivals/index.shtml

In the screenshot, we see 6 purple links, 14 red links, and 31
green (good?) links.  Of the 31 green links, the three nearest
the top are internal to the LinkFest, leaving 28 external links
not detected as bad by the link checker.  However, closer
examination reveals that about half of those 28 links are in
fact stale.  Below is a rundown on the definitely stale ones
plus a couple questionable ones.  Let me emphasize that my
point is *not* to whine to NEFFA/Dan about the LinkFest not
being maintained, nor to to whine about the (former?) owners
of the target pages of the bad links.  My point is to
illustrate some of the varied ways that links can go stale,
and to ask whether there are automatic tools that can do a
better job of detecting them.

     Belgium - World Festival of Folklore
     http://come.to/schoten
          Redirects to a page in the domain www.realtor.com

     Canada - index
     http://www.festivalfinder.com
          Site is apparently under construction: "Welcome to
         FestivalFinder.com a Diverse, Festival Listing Site
         – Coming Soon!" (but what does "Soon" really mean?)
         Versions captured in the Internet Archive from May
         1997 through June 2015 seem to have been working.

     Canada/Alberta - Calgary - Hispanic Performing Arts ...
     http://www.geocities.com/~hispanicarts/
         Redirects to https://smallbusiness.yahoo.com (as do
         other geocities sites)

     England - Chippenham Folk Festival</A> - In Chippenham
     http://members.aol.com/chippfolk/index.html
         Redirects to an AOL login page.  If I got an AOL
         account and logged in, it might indeed take me to
         a page having something to do with the Chippenham
         Folk Festival.  I'm not about to try.

     KY - Gray Hawk - Stringbean Memorial Bluegrass Festival - ...
     http://www.geocities.com/stringfest/
         Redirects to https://smallbusiness.yahoo.com

     Netherlands - index
     http://www.euronet.nl/~trio/
         Last updated 31 May 2011.  However, it doesn't seem
         to claim to have any regularly updated calendar
         information.  It just has a bunch of links (some
         good, some stale) to other sites.

     PA - Elmhurst - Endless Mountains Blues Fest - ...
     http://www.blues101.org
         Now a page full of text in some Asian language.

     TN - Sevierville - Bluegrass in the Smokies - ...
     http://www.BluegrassInTheSmokies.com
         The banner at the top says "Bluegrassinthesmokies.com"
         but the contents are stuff about bodybuilding and ads
         for tree services.  (I am not making this up.)

     UK - Ipswich - International Country Music Festival - ...
     http://www.minifest.co.uk/
         Goes to a page soliciting offers to buy the domain name.

     United Kingdom - Stirrings' Folk Festival Newsletter
     http://www.stirrings.co.uk/folkzone/index.html
         Goes to http://www.stirrings.co.uk which appears to
         advertise live music for weddings and other event.  The 
         current content deems very different from in Internet
         Archive snapshots from 10 years ago or so, which show
         the online version of a folk, roots and acoustic music
         magazine.

     USA - CA - Napa Valley Music Festival - Three days in September
     http://www.napafest.com
         "... The owner of napafest.com is offering it for sale ..."

     USA - CA - Old-Time Fiddlers' Convention - also has singing, ...
     http://www.fiddlersconvention.org/dpage.php?page_id=1
         "This Account has been suspended."

     USA - CT - NOMAD (NOrtheast Music And Dance) Festival - ...
     http://www.nomadfest.org/
         "No NOMAD Festival in 2008" -- and if there has been
         one since then, the organizers seem to have have been 
         darn quiet about it on the web.

     USA - index - Festival Finder
     http://www.festivalfinder.com
         Supposedly under construction (see "Canada - index" above).

     USA - MA - Boston Folk Festival</A> - Mid-September
     http://www.bostonfolkfestival.org/
         The site, which seems to be administered by radio
         station, WUMB doesn't appear (at the time I write
         this) to show any info about a mid-September folk
         festival, though it does show info abut registration
         being open for summer acoustic music weeks in July
         and August

     USA - MA - Greater New Bedford Summerfest - ...
     http://www.barrel-of-music.com
         "BUY THIS DOMAIN  The owner of barrel-of-music.com
         is offering it for sale ..."

Oddly, one link marked as red by the checker seems to be good:

     movable - Folk Alliance Conference - Yearly conference for ...
     http://www.folk.org

--Jim