End of Storify Archival Tool
On 12 December 2017, I received a very disheartening email from a great online tool. Storify was shutting down! Storify was a great tool that allowed you to archive social media posts via a hashtag and allow you to look back at the events of that hashtag or event. Below is the email in full, but be careful to not start weeping as I did. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Here at UCET, we have used Storify quite a bit for everything from archiving weekly #UTedChat chats to keeping track of social posts made during our annual UCET Conferences and #EdcampUT events. While this isn’t the end of the world for social media usage, it does make for a little sticky situation. How will we now archive our social posts during our events we as an organization put on and during the weekly #UTedChat events? But even more than that, is there actually a need for archiving of these events at all? Those are two questions I don’t know how to answer yet, especially that last one about the actual “need” for archiving the events anyways. As a bit of a digital packrat (and maybe even a little physical as well) I like to know we have an archive of these events because I find it useful to go back over the events afterward as a sort of “review your notes” kind of thing. But I know not everyone feels the same way. With that being said, if any of you come across a good replacement for Storify, please pass it along so I can continue to archive and then review the awesome things shared at UCET hosted and sponsored events going forward.
For those of you haven’t heard this awful news yet here’s the email I received complete with the timeline for closure.
Dear Storify Customer,
Thank you for contributing your stories to the Storify community. Unfortunately, Storify.com will no longer be available after May 16, 2018. While product end-of-life is a part of the overall product life cycle, we understand that this could impact you and are committed to making the transition as smooth as possible.
Here are important dates to be aware of. We will provide ongoing reminders of upcoming milestones over the coming months.
December 12, 2017 • No new accounts can be created on Storify.com
May 1, 2018 • No new stories can be created
May 16, 2018, 5pm PST • Last opportunity to export content using the export functionality on Storify.com • All site functionality will be removed • Customer support will be discontinued
For more information, read the full FAQ: https://storify.com/faq-eol. Please contact support@storify.com with any questions.
We would like to thank you again for your loyal support of Storify and apologize for any inconvenience these changes may cause.
Thank you,
The Storify Team
