Many websites like to keep their old articles up and that is because the internet can be a powerful thing.
With a click of a button, you can find stories from the past. The web can be your new permanent record.
So if you do change an article from the past, wouldn’t that mean you are trying to rewrite history?
I’m not sure about anyone else but I personally feel like if it’s already news and an article, changing it online doesn’t change anything that HAS happened.
A comment that you made years ago is what made you who you are today. Even though you may have different opinions now, it doesn’t change a thing you said a few years ago, even if it gets deleted from the web.
Another thing is that I feel like if a site deletes an entire article because it is false, they are lying to people and not correcting what they have said. Deleting the article doesn’t solve everything.
Imagine if there were one hundred people who read an article and that article was deleted in the next minute because it was false. If the article was never fixed, those hundred people would have false information.
Sure it doesn’t sound like a lot of people, but what if those people goes online and spread that false information around, since they haven’t gotten an update that it was not true.
You cannot rewrite history, but you can correct it.
Fading Letters 