Imagine playing one of your favorite childhood MS-DOS games on one of the newest social network sites. That's exactly what's happening with users tapping the Internet Archive and using Twitter and a desktop PC.
The Internet Archive is an online library that has digitized everything from music to pictures to websites and yes, games. Back in January, the site established an MS-DOS software library and some fun classics are within reach, including Prince of Persia, Oregon Trail, Maniac Mansion and even Burger Time. Even Sim City is there.
The archive also houses less popular games, including Caveman Ugh-Lympics. They're all running via the MS-Dos emulator Dosbox.
What an opportunity relive that fun of yesteryear and share it with your latest friends.
To share games via Twitter, or play a game on Twitter, just copy the URL from any of the thousands of games at Internet Archive, put it in a tweet and you're off. Reports say it works in the Web version of Twitter and the TweetDeck client.
Just keep in mind, like anything with technology, it's not completely perfect. Controls can be tricky as there is no instruction, so it's kind of learn as you go using the keyboard, and you can't use the full-screen capability as you can on the archive's home page. Also, at least for now, game access isn't compatible with any mobile device.
When you visit the archive, which was founded in 1996, you may just want to take a few minutes to read up on its history, which truly illustrates what the Internet is really all about. The archive is available to researchers, historians and scholars.
"The Archive has no vested interest in the discoveries of the users of its collections, nor is it a grant-making organization," states the project's "about" page. The page includes tons of links to other Internet collections and free services such as The Alexa Internet, which catalogues websites.
One of the most interesting aspects regarding the Archive is reading up on those running the Archive given the extensive backgrounds and experiences each is bringing to the effort.
