Welcome to the Archival Internet Video Index (new title pending)! This index collects information about and links to videos on digital networking technology produced from roughly the late 1970s up to the early 2000s. They cover a variety of topics, from PLATO to the World Wide Web. More information on the index and how to use it can be found on the assocated page linked above.

Who created this index, and why?

This index is maintained by Avery Dame-Griff, curator of the Queer Digital History Project. Over the years, I’ve curated a long playlist of archival footage of early digital communications technology but didn’t have an organized way to easily access them. In May 2023, when it appeared that Google might be removing videos posted to YouTube by now-inactive accounts, I quickly converted this playlist into a spreadsheet. However, once Google announced they weren’t actually going to be removing videos, I initally wasn’t sure what to do with all the links I’d collected. Several months of fiddling later and I’d hit upon the idea of turning it into an index. Thus, the Archival Video Index was born.