Having just been saying how much I like the new Guardian URL scheme, it was interesting to see the URL for this article from today’s paper. The article is about some early hominan[1] remains that have been found in northern Spain. The URL is
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/mar/27/archaeology.dinosaurs
I can obviously see why it’s in the science section. And of course it’s about archaeology. But “dinosaurs”? What connection do hominina have with dinosaurs? They are separated in time by about sixty million years. URLs like these only work if the person assigning them has an understanding of the subject area.
And, of course, it’s too late to correct it now as URLs are permanent :-)
[1] I originally put “hominid” there believing it to be the correct word. But according the Wikipedia, the definition of hominid has gradually changed to encompass all the great apes. Humans and their closely related species are now apparently described as hominina. That’s something new I’ve learned today.
The last path component of the URLs is usually formed from the first two keywords assigned to the content (not always though, as it can be manually overridden). You can see the keywords on the article itself.It’s simply been tagged incorrectly. These things happen and, yes, that URL will probably work forever now :) I’ve reported it to the people who fix such things.
Corrected. With a shiny new URL (the old one still works though).