On Tuesday, Google quietly announced on their blog (or rather, quiet among the din of Bezos-Post news) a new feature in search results — in-depth article results.The new feature would list three longer articles that give background and historical context for a search term — everything from happiness and legos to censorship and capital punishment — and is already being rolled out.Of course, Google’s spokespeople wouldn’t reveal how the algorithms work. Their Webmaster Tools section does list some handy site architecture tips, although none of these seem any different than standard best practices for getting indexed by Google and listed in Google News.However, rather curiously, the Webmaster Tools page does say that subscription sites may have a hard time getting indexed and recommend paid content sites use Google’s First Click Free (you really don’t have to — a metered paywall or one that lets in referral traffic from search engines will suffice). Yet their screenshot example features an in-depth article by subscription site The Wall Street Journal:

This means that Google is favoring name-brand publishers and articles that establish context, even though Google claims there’s no “white list” of publications. And from a consumer standpoint, this may make sense — a search for Gloria Steinem yielded three in-depth articles, one of which was her seminal 1969 article in New York Magazine, “After Black Power, Women’s Liberation.”Unfortunately, this is bad news for sites without name-brand awareness or historical articles to their name.So in short, Google’s new in-depth articles feature can be a boon to subscription sites that are legacy publications and big names, but just more noise for online-only brands with smaller audiences to holler over.