MTV News was shut down after being a source of music and entertainment news for nearly 40 years. Now, over a year later, the MTV News digital news archive has been pulled offline. This occurred with little to no warning.

According to consequence.net, this archive contained thousands of interviews, news stories, profiles, and other different editorial features. The digital archive dated back to 1996, and countless writers had poured their heart and soul into their work for MTV News over the past 30 years. Now, the only way they can access their work is through Wayback Machine.

Consequence.net discusses the different reasons why the digital archive was pulled. Paramount Global, MTV’s parent company, allegedly might not have been willing to pay for errors and omissions insurance or for the associated expenses associated with the archive. Since MTV News was so well known and expansive, these costs allegedly might have been through the roof. With MTV News being shut down for over a year, they had not been producing revenue, so this theory seems logical.

However, consequence.net also points out just how influential and important MTV News has been over the years. With an archive such an impact on media and entertainment, some believe that they could have found a way to continue generating revenue. The archive could’ve been monetized, or they could have continued to produce content.

For now, we will just have to rely on Wayback Machine in order to access the MTV News digital archive, which consequence.net calls an “important relic of music history.”