This could be a handy research option.
Today, Google has announced a new partnership with The Internet Archive’s “Wayback Machine” which will make it easier to scan for previous versions of a website, and find older, potentially removed content.
The process will essentially enable you to view archived versions of webpages directly through Google Search, so you can dig deeper into any site, based on what they’ve shared in the past.
As explained by The Wayback Machine:
“To access this new feature, conduct a search on Google as usual. Next to each search result, you’ll find three dots, and clicking on these will bring up the “About this Result” panel. Within this panel, select “More About This Page” to reveal a link to the Wayback Machine page for that website.”
Via this link, you’ll then be able to view previous versions of the webpage, with content facilitated by The Wayback Machine, helping to uncover older versions of the site.
The Wayback Machine, powered by The Internet Archive, is a handy resource for uncovering older documents, and tracking changes in how brands have communicated different elements. Or, you know, old tweets, old posts, etc.
And it’s an element that Google users have been requesting (especially since Google removed cache links earlier this year).
As per Google:
“We know that many people, including those in the research community, value being able to see previous versions of webpages when available. That’s why we’ve added links to the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine to our ‘About this page’ feature, to give people quick context and make this helpful information easily accessible through Search,”
The Internet Archive recently lost a lawsuit against big publishers over its archiving of old books, in order to make them freely accessible on the web. The Second Circuit US Court of Appeals ruled that this is tantamount to piracy, which will impact the Archive’s capacity to provide retrospective content, at least in some forms.
As such, the deal with Google is a significant win, which will refer more users towards the archive for research.
So now, if you want to dig a little deeper into website changes, and do your own sleuthing, you’ll have another option at your fingertips.