76.7% of old web links are dead: a 657,607-link autopsy

Where did the old web go? We followed 657,607 links to find out

A restored 0.mk database from 2009–2014 held 657,607 short links. Following every destination in August 2026, 76.7% of crawlable records no longer loaded. The data reveals the fragility of the small web: personal blogs, forums, and local news vanished at far higher rates than platforms like YouTube and Wikipedia. The article also uncovers gems like the first link ever shortened (a CSS stylesheet) and a link to localhost that got two clicks.