The press release that went out this morning detailing the launch of Screenshots.com wasn’t the initial draft.
Luckily, we caught a screenshot of it, using the valuable service of Screenshots.com itself and we’re able to share it with you today 😀
DomainTools, the only WHOIS tool that frustrated domainers really need in order to find out who owns a domain they want badly, today launched Screenshots.com – a web site that allows users to snoop into the past history of a web site. Screenshots.com provides an embarrassing view into the past of poorly designed web site homepages. Users can track and realize how badly web sites were designed and most importantly, how bad they look still.
After recent corporate hires, DomainTools spent roughly two whole hours rebuilding the thumbnail engine that for years has provided a voyeuristic look into the domain name detail information available at DomainTools.com. By using Screenshots.com for something other than adult content, DomainTools is able to able to show off that it has capable programmers and developers.
Screenshots.com was created on a lazy Sunday afternoon and packs key features to help users spy on competitive web sites, easily wade through the pathetic attempts of web site developers to produce something better than doodles on digital parchment and point out embarrassing details and omissions on web sites. Visitors can quickly uncover who was the smart Alec who got the domain first, find similar web sites that don’t suck as much and learn how little web design aesthetics have improved since the AOL days. The site includes the ability for users to spy on web sites’ screenshots at any time. The Featured Screenshot section on the home page rotates between embarrassing web sites that were hacked and 0wn3ed and stores them for future reference, should any of them tries to pull a fast one.
The DomainTools thumbnail image capture system, the back-end service for Screenshots.com, was developed in 2006 and it’s the only screenshot you won’t find in the system. The current version now checks more than a million web sites a day, which means that DomainTools will be hiring more database programmers. Unlike other screenshot services, it captures all the proof you need in order to embarrass that rival webmaster and show what a crappy job they consistently do, as a picture is worth 1,000 tweets. With Screenshots.com, what you see is exactly what a visitor would have seen when they visited the web site – excluding Chinese visitors behind the government firewall. Domain flippers, lawyers with itchy fingers and copycats alike have relied upon DomainTools’ screenshot history tool to fully engage in unmentionable activity related to the generation of money and profit.
For nearly 10 years, DomainTools has provided users with enough reasons to be jealous and angry at their parents – if only they had been born earlier when all those premium domains were still available, and the launch of Screenshots.com helps extend that miserable feeling even more. Together with DomainTools.com, DailyChanges.com, ReverseWhois.com, Reversemx.com and ReverseEsrever.com, individuals, small fry domainers and many large fish in the domain sea use DomainTools’ cornucopia of tools to do everything; from finding how many domains they could have had if they were available, to watching the domain they forgot to renew fall in the hands of pornographers.
It doesnt conclude the recent 2010+ screenshots, it should really update many websites there if they are looking to become the next web.archive.org.