The definition of “amateur” is almost as variable as the characteristics of amateur websites about the Holocaust. Amateur can mean simply “nonprofessional”; it can also have a variety of derogatory connotations, such as ‘incompetent,’ ‘unskilled,’ ‘maladroit,’ etc. On the Internet, it is very easy for amateurs to create their own websites, which means there are a multitude of sites about the Holocaust that are non-professional in several different ways. There is a significant amount of overlap between amateur pages and every other type of website about the Holocaust, because amateurs feel qualified to talk about all of these subjects and more.
A wide variety of people have attempted their own versions of the history of the Holocaust. These sites often focus on widely accepted ‘facts’ about the Holocaust rather than a deeper understanding of the event. They also generally fail to provide resources for the information they list. Most of these sites are characterized by simple language and are geared towards a young or uninformed audience. These sites are not harmful; the information they provide is generally correct, however it does provide a rather simple way of considering the Holocaust.
Pages of “facts” about the Holocaust are an interesting trend. Most of the information that comes from these sites must be taken with a grain of salt. Similar to History Pages, these pages often provide ‘factual’ information without any citations or linked sources. Some are accurate, while some are far from it. The purpose is incredibly varied; some seek to prove or disprove the existence of the Holocaust, while others seek merely to provide information about the event. It is important to understand these sites, because they are often the ones that are linked to when the average person does a simple search for “facts about the Holocaust.” To the uninformed viewer, these types of sites have the potential to be wildly misleading.
Opinion pages about the Holocaust are (to an experienced student of the Holocaust) a somewhat frightening phenomena. These pages can best be described as personal diatribes. The majority of them are Antisemitic. Some that we have examined are downright hateful or paranoid. These pages have the potential to influence many people’s views of the Holocaust or of Jewish people and culture in a negative way. They are typically not informed by scholarly sources, though they claim to be the ultimate authority. These pages tend to be a poor representation of the Holocaust on the internet.