reading through the faq from archive.org i came across this excerpt that caught my eye:

“Can I download files via FTP?

Yes - via anonymous FTP. We highly recommend using FTP to download large files.

On the item’s details page, look for the “FTP” link next to “all files” on the left side of the page. Click the “FTP” link and you’ll see all the files listed and the ftp address where you can find them.

Open your FTP program, connect to that ftp address, and then download the file you want. The advantage of using FTP is that it will usually handle a service disruption gracefully. If it gets interrupted, when the service is back it should resume the download where it left off.”

[ http://www.archive.org/about/faqs.php#Downloading_Content ]

i fired up filezilla and poked around, hrm all i see are 4 directories, none of which are very descriptive. back to the faq and start reading from the top.

“How can I get a copy of the pages on my Web site? If my site got hacked or damaged, could I get a backup from the Archive?’

Our terms of use do not cover backups for the general public. However, you may use the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to locate and access archived versions of your web site. We can’t guarantee that your site has been or will be archived. For siteowners only we offer limited backup capabilites. Send your request to info at archive dot org for more information.

Can people download sites from the Wayback?

Our terms of use specify that users of the Wayback Machine are not to copy data from the collection. If there are special circumstances that you think the Archive should consider, please contact info at archive dot org.”

boooo. i guess i’ll have to go through the various backup disks/cds/dvds i have if i ever want to re-create old sites that i’ve never migrated. i added bonq.net back in the day, so you can always attempt to search through their archives but a lot of my old images were never archived by archive.org. eh. maybe i’ll eventually re-add those w/ some mod_rewrite magic so that bonq’s web archives don’t return little red x’s all over the place.