When a Website suddenly erases the information you have quoted....

This has happened to me so many times! Yes, I know wiki is forever changing and being revised, but it's not always wiki doing this.

Sometimes I have quoted information that has probably caused great embarassment to certain establishments and sometimes within 2 to 24 hours the page from their website can either no longer be found or the information is modified so that my quote appears invalid.

What can I do in a case like this?

Is there a way to go back to some archive and make a screen shot?
How do I make a screen shot?
How do I retrieve the original information?
Thanks.

Wayback Machine can be helpful

And cached pages. Other than that I would say the only way to get what you are asking for is to have taken a screenshot of the page. When information gets deleted or changed on the source, backend of the site..it is gone.

Time travel is the answer.

In fact, I am going to travel back in time to read ATS after the government finally removes it from the net.

Start saving up for a DeLorean.

You do not have much more time before it is too late.

I use the Download Helper add on for firefox which has a screenshot grab incorporated into it.

That way, if you're concerned info will be removed you can capture it in image form to use later.

Trouble is, how do you know which info is going to disappear?

Originally posted by Smell The Roses
Wayback Machine can be helpful

And cached pages. Other than that I would say the only way to get what you are asking for is to have taken a screenshot of the page. When information gets deleted or changed on the source, backend of the site..it is gone.

I am not 'tech savvy'. What is a cached page? Is this a process you do yourself?

What does "backend of site" mean?

Originally posted by Psychoses
I use the Download Helper add on for firefox which has a screenshot grab incorporated into it.

That way, if you're concerned info will be removed you can capture it in image form to use later.

Trouble is, how do you know which info is going to disappear?

Do it for everything. That's what big hard drives are for. Spread the info around, tell everyone to save the image, that way it is safe from such cover-up measures.

Originally posted by Alethea

Originally posted by Smell The Roses
Wayback Machine can be helpful

And cached pages. Other than that I would say the only way to get what you are asking for is to have taken a screenshot of the page. When information gets deleted or changed on the source, backend of the site..it is gone.

I am not 'tech savvy'. What is a cached page? Is this a process you do yourself?

What does "backend of site" mean?

Backend means the user panel for a website. Most CMS's (content management systems), including wordpress and joomla have back ends that are very easy to update from. One could change what is on a site in a matter of seconds...

Now cache means, when you use your search engine..and the results come up...next to and to the lower left of each sites name should be a little button that says cache. This will be the recorded page that was snapshotted by google. In the case that google didn't take another snapshot before you cache the page you may find what you are looking for. Sometimes I will use the cache function to check a site that loads slow...as it shows u the instant TEXT only snapshot and takes a lot less time to load.

Hope that helped a little.

reply to post by Alethea


Hello,
What I do is copy and paste entire page and email it to myself!!!
Once the page dies, I guess the links on it does or does not, I don't know???
But it's in my inbox anyways!!!

(ETA)From your email you can do as would normally do to save, and or upload. That should help, I hope!!!



[edit on (4/2/1010 by loveguy]

Originally posted by Smell The Roses

Hope that helped a little.

Yes, it helped very much.

Thank you all for the advice and directions.

reply to post by Alethea


Get the part showing on your monitor - that you want to save -

Then hit the "Control" key at the same time as the "Print Screen" key.

Then pull up an email - or a word doc - and right click on the blank

space - and click "Paste".

Wah lah.



Note this will ONLY save/show what shows on your monitor - it will be a hard copy - not an active one - meaning, you won't be able to click any links on it - it will be an "image" only.

But it's a great resource for saving things you don't want to lose - or if you are afraid the website author will change or alter the page in the future.

Also, if it's a long page - or you want to save a part that is more than what will fit on your monitor screen - you can do the first part, then the second part, etc.

If you have more than one part, just paste them onto the same email or word doc -


[edit on 2-4-2010 by nomorecruelty]

Explanation: S&F!

To take a screen shot capture: Press Cntrl and Print Screen buttons in a hot key fashion [i.e. together] and then open a new MSpaint [or equivilant] and then press Cntrl and v [i.e. paste hot keys] which will paste the screen capture onto the blank page. Then save as a .bmp for high quality and as a .jpg for low quality. May have to been done several times to capture a whole page!

Also under File tab on IE8 there is a Save as option!
Note that you can save the file as in various formats!

Personal Disclosure: I hope that helps!

If you are on Windows, have an email program setup to handle "Send to" type actions from the system, also known as the system default email handler, and you're using Internet Explorer, tap the 'alt' key if the menu bar is not showing then click on "File" then "Send..." then "Page by email...". Your email program should pop up with an email with the entire web page in it- then you can send it to yourself.

And if you keep getting your edits removed, complain to the wiki staff, giving them copies of your edits with source references for any facts you state. If your complaints are valid, they should research who is removing your edits and either ban them from editing or lock the wiki page so it can't be edited.

reply to post by OmegaLogos


On some laptops, the user would press "FN" then the "PRT SC" or similar.

[edit on 4/2/2010 by abecedarian]

If you feel you are posting something that might be lost
you could save the site ahead of time with HTTrack here
Its a free program that will rip the whole site. ( doesn't always work with scripts)
but it does the job. It will if you want to even go as far as downloading links on the site.
And yes its Free.

Also if you wanting to save video from youtube and such there is AtubeCatcher
here
works on a lot of sites and also converts for you.
That is also free

for screen capture ( quickly)
I hit the print screen
open MSPaint or Gimp ( here ) and paste as new document
then I save my file
That is also free

Need a spoiler tag
but good info you might want
|
|
|
V

There are sometimes you find yourself watching a good documentary but its Divx, you can save the temp files and or have it save after viewing.
If you can't wait for the hole buffer and you have Adblocker click the red button ( top right of firefox )
so the "stuff" on the bottom of the window shows, find the address of the video in the strings ( .flv , .avi , and such ) right click that into a new tab/window then save page as ( under file menu) then you can watch your video later and off line.

Originally posted by Alethea
Is there a way to go back to some archive and make a screen shot?
How do I make a screen shot?

Edit to add: What the above posters said. I may be stupid, but at least I'm sloooow.

On a PC Ctrl + "Print Screen" button upper right on keyboard.
(Alt + Print Screen active window only)

It is stored in a "buffer" which you can Paste into a word doc then save to folder.
or MS Paint then Save As bmp or jpeg.

On a Mac. Command + Shift +3 it will save as Picture (png) to desktop.

I have an ATS folder on all my computers where I store screen captures described above.

Someone can confirm or offer more elegant workflow, my brain ain't what it used to be.
Hope that helps.

Regards...kk

[edit on 2-4-2010 by kinda kurious]

Originally posted by Mr Mask
Time travel is the answer.

In fact, I am going to travel back in time to read ATS after the government finally removes it from the net.

Start saving up for a DeLorean.

You do not have much more time before it is too late.

Mr. Mask,

Here you go again with your incendiarious commentary!!!! Enough is Enough!!
Where are the Mods??

Sorry, I just thought I'd get in and steal the fire from the usual one or two who like to shoot at you on site

Personally, I always enjoy reading someone who isn't afraid to call a spade a spade

I guess that's why you're on my 'friends' list

Now, back on track.

To the OP, I see that you've already got lots of essential advice on how to record something off the net. Forgive me if someone did already mention this, but if it's just text that you're after, then what I usually do is just
select
copy
then paste

either into Word, or if security is an issue, I dump my cached copy or word file (If you choose to save it as a Word document, then you can upload as a file to G Docs) into my Google Docs account - which I can highly recommend as a fairly secure archive by the way.

NB: just to add - I'm not sure how computer savvy you are, but if you actually have a "Print Screen" button on the top right of your keyboard, there is no need to use the "Cntrl" key

By the way, whenever you do use Print Screen, you have to paste the print before you use the Print Screen function again. Otherwise you lose the previously cached Print Screen file.

Almost forgot: if you're saving it to later prove it was actually written and published on a certain site, and on a certain date, by a certain author, then you are best to use "Cntrl" + "A" - that will select everything on the screen - and hopefully the date, author, and publisher. Then after you have selected all, then "Cntrl" + "C" to copy the entire document. Depending on where you decide to paste "Cntrl" + "V", the article, the format may or may not be a little screwy. The newer version does a good job of retaining the format, and Google Docs, seem to be better than they were doing before. Either way, you won't have any real problem. It's for pedantics like me to who like to have everything perfect ;-)

Hope that helps



[edit on 3-4-2010 by mckyle]