Wayback Machine gets funding to rebuild and add keyword searching

The Wayback Machine (http://www.archive.org/), also known as the Internet Archive,  is always a popular site on my search workshops. It is a fantastic way of discovering how web pages looked in the past and for tracking down documents that are no longer on the live web.

It isn't 100% guaranteed to have what you are looking for and at present you need the URL of the web site or document in order to use it. People often ask if keyword searching is possible; it isn't at the moment but it will be.

The Internet Archive has received support from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation (LJAF) and will be re-building the Wayback Machine. When it is completed in 2017, the next generation Wayback Machine will have more webpages that are easier to find and will include keyword indexing of homepages.

Further details of the rebuild are on the Internet Archive blog at http://blog.archive.org/2015/10/21/grant-to-develop-the-next-generation-wayback-machine/

Google introduces RankBrain

We've known for some time that Google has been buying heavily into artificial intelligence and looking at applying it not only to its robotics and driverless cars projects but also to search. Now it is official: artificial intelligence and machine learning plays a major role in processing Google queries and is, Google says,  the third most important signal in ranking results. It has been named RankBrain.

Danny Sullivan covers the story in Search Engine Land and looks at the implications for search. There is a follow up story  by Danny that goes into more detail, FAQ: All About The New Google RankBrain Algorithm, and he makes a guess at what the number 1 and 2 ranking signals are (Google won't say!).

Both are very interesting articles on how Google is using RankBrain in search especially the FAQ,  which is a "must read" if you want to begin to understand how Google is now handling your search.