Overview

• As of August 11–12, Reddit updated its crawl controls to block the Wayback Machine from indexing subreddit pages, post details, comments and profiles, allowing only the homepage to be archived.
• The company notified the Internet Archive in advance and has begun “ramping up” enforcement, while existing snapshots remain accessible for now.
• Reddit cites evidence that some AI firms have been scraping archived pages to bypass its multimillion-dollar licensing deals with partners such as Google and OpenAI.
• Journalists and researchers warn the change will hinder recovery of deleted posts and weaken the historical record of Reddit discussions.
• Ongoing talks with the Internet Archive and the rise of alternative tools like Bellingcat’s Auto Archiver offer potential workarounds for preserving web content.