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Google will no longer back up the Internet: Cached webpages are dead (arstechnica.com)

submitted 4 months ago by Powderhorn@beehaw.org to c/technology@beehaw.org

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[-] alyaza@beehaw.org 42 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Google "Search Liaison" Danny Sullivan confirmed the feature removal in an X post, saying the feature "was meant for helping people access pages when way back, you often couldn't depend on a page loading. These days, things have greatly improved. So, it was decided to retire it."

okay but... has it? this seems like an unfounded premise, intuitively speaking

[-] Semi-Hemi-Demigod@kbin.social 19 points 4 months ago

"What excuse could we use for this cost-cutting measure?"

"Uh, we could just say that people don't need it anymore."

"Johnson, get that man a promotion!"

[-] otter@lemmy.ca 9 points 4 months ago

Yea I've been using it more and more recently, although part of that is sites like Twitter or Reddit randomly hiding content

[-] ciferecaNinjo@fedia.io 3 points 4 months ago

Bingo. When I read that part of the article, I felt insulted. People see the web getting increasingly enshitified and less accessible. The increased need for cached pages has justified the existence of 12ft.io.

~40% of my web access is now dependant on archive.org and 12ft.io.

So yes, Google is obviously bullshitting. Clearly there is a real reason for nixing cached pages and Google is concealing that reason.