{"id":30082,"date":"2026-02-04T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/?p=30082"},"modified":"2026-02-03T16:46:47","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T16:46:47","slug":"inside-the-new-wayback-machine-plugin-for-wordpress","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/2026\/02\/04\/inside-the-new-wayback-machine-plugin-for-wordpress\/","title":{"rendered":"Preserving the Open Web: Inside the New Wayback Machine Plugin for WordPress\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class='__iawmlf-post-loop-links' style='display:none;' 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20:11:42&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-08 20:19:00&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-09 20:59:10&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-10 23:29:57&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-12 00:00:26&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-13 00:08:02&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-14 01:38:22&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-15 01:40:07&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-16 01:43:59&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200}],&quot;broken&quot;:false,&quot;last_checked&quot;:{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-16 01:43:59&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:200},&quot;process&quot;:&quot;done&quot;}]'><\/div>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"332\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image-1024x332.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-30083\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image-1024x332.png 1024w, https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image-300x97.png 300w, https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image-768x249.png 768w, https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image-1536x497.png 1536w, https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image-624x202.png 624w, https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image.png 1544w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Link rot<\/em>. There\u2019s nothing quite as frustrating as clicking on a link that leads to nowhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>WordPress, which powers more than 40% of websites online, recently partnered with the Internet Archive to address this problem. Engineers from the Internet Archive and Automattic worked together to create a plugin that can be added to a WordPress website to improve the user experience and check the Wayback Machine for an archived version of any webpage that has been moved, changed or taken down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The free <strong>Internet Archive Wayback Machine Link Fixer, <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/internet-archive-wayback-machine-link-fixer\/\">publicly launched last fall<\/a>, combats link rot by seamlessly redirecting the user to a reliable backup page when it encounters a missing page. When the plugin is added to a website, it will do a scan, see what pages exist, and then automatically save those pages to a queue to be archived. If it doesn&#8217;t exist, then it will be sent for capture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/internet-archive-wayback-machine-link-fixer\/\">DOWNLOAD THE PLUGIN<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Once the software is installed on a WordPress website, the plugin will auto redirect users to the Wayback Machine version of a missing page.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Broken links are one of the web\u2019s most relentless problems. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/data-labs\/2024\/05\/17\/when-online-content-disappears\/\">Pew Research<\/a> found that 38% of the web has disappeared over the past decade and for web admins, \u201cIt&#8217;s a never-ending game of whack-a-mole to keep links working,\u201d said Matt Blumberg, Product Manager with the Wayback Machine. \u201cThis <a href=\"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/internet-archive-wayback-machine-link-fixer\/\">new tool<\/a> prevents those inevitable 404s by automatically updating links to a preserved copy and it proactively archives pages in the Wayback Machine, where they\u2019re kept accessible for free, long-term, so your site stays usable without manual fixes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-pullquote\"><blockquote><p>\u201cIt\u2019s very important that websites have a memory and that the web overall as has a memory. We are increasingly using [the web] as our only source of truth. When links go dead, in effect, the truth goes dead. This has become even more important in the world of AI.\u201d<\/p><cite>Alexander Rose, Director of Long-term Futures for Automattic Inc.<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Many WordPress websites are homespun and are most susceptible to having links go dead.\u00a0Remedying this problem is not only valuable to individuals, but also to the overall culture, said Alexander Rose, Director of Long-term Futures for Automattic Inc., the technology company behind WordPress.com.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe need to have an accurate memory of the things that get said, posted, and the ways that we have communicated over time,\u201d Rose said. \u201cOtherwise we&#8217;re either doomed to repeat errors or we&#8217;re going to make choices that are uninformed by the past.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The link fixer is expanding the \u201cheroic effort\u201d made by the Internet Archive over the years to preserve everything from small websites to NASA.gov and WhiteHouse.gov, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s very important that websites have a memory and that the web overall as has a memory,\u201d Rose said. \u201cWe are increasingly using [the web] as our only source of truth. When links go dead, in effect, the truth goes dead. This has become even more important in the world of AI.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As the plugin rolls out, Rose and Blumberg said they are open to feedback. The goal is to make the software as easy as possible to use. Next, they will fine tune the features and promote its broad use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cAs it becomes a solid piece of software that people know and like, then I think it has a path to being integrated much more deeply,\u201d Rose said. \u201cIt\u2019s early days, but every person I\u2019ve talked to about it is excited to see the potential end of the dreaded 404 error.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Link rot. There\u2019s nothing quite as frustrating as clicking on a link that leads to nowhere. WordPress, which powers more than 40% of websites online, recently partnered with the Internet [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":366,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[249,16],"tags":[347,1067],"class_list":["post-30082","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-announcements","category-wayback-machine","tag-wayback-machine","tag-wordpress"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30082","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/366"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30082"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30082\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30084,"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30082\/revisions\/30084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30082"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30082"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.archive.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30082"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}