Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Malls of America: R.I.P.

As of today, the much appreciated Malls of America blog has been removed from Blogger. Keith Milford's work over the past several years chronicling the history of retail was legendary and remarkably thorough. The commentary was always informative and fun, and the photo quality was consistently good.

Malls of America was around for a couple of years before new posts came to an abrupt, unexplained end about a year and a half ago, but it served as the inspiration for at least a half-dozen blogs and websites. I was a supporter to the end, and I kept going back to the site for a while hoping to see new posts. Alas, it was not to be.

If you've never seen the site, check out the archived version before it's too late.

11 comments:

  1. I hope somebody saved the pictures...

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  2. I'm not sure if anyone did. You could likely find a bunch of them on an internet archive, but I don't think anybody anticipated the site going down without a warning.

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  3. It's awful to hear/see that the Hall of Fame went under, as it was a great reference tool and entertaining source of information. It helped to pique my interest in mid-1960s modernist architecture. I hope the owner is okay and wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors.

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  4. As far as I know, Keith is okay. He has a number of other websites, and most seem to be updated on a regular basis.

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  5. It's too bad no one saw the value in keeping it up. That was the first site to pique my interest in blogs. It's a shame.

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  6. I'm sure someone out there had a backup plan. There are a lot more mall fans out there than it seems.

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  7. This is my backup plan: it's a combination MoA mirror and retail website:

    http://retailaddictionblog.blogspot.com/

    It's not nearly as complete, however, but there is hope...

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  8. I figured that was what you were up to. Good job.

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  9. Someone claiming to be Keith (or perhaps Keith himself) is pleading for Google to fix MallsofAmerica. I don't think it's him, based on his (or her) tone and the fact that its the first time "mallsofamerica" has called for help:
    http://groups.google.com/group/blogger-help-troubleshoot/browse_thread/thread/8df185f2aa8b20d2?pli=1

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  10. It's back!!

    http://mallsofamerica.blogspot.com/

    as of 5PM Central Time!

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  11. I noticed, though I haven't had time to make a proper entry.

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