Remember a few days ago I told you Google was going to make changes to Google Image Search because of the Getty Images legal spat and deal they closed recently? Well, within a few days Google made those changes already.

Google announced yesterday on Twitter:

So as I said Google Image search will make the copyright disclaimer more prominent and remove the view image button from the interface. They did both of those and also removed the feature to Search by Image button but the reverse image search is still there.

Here is the before:

Here is the after:

Of course, searchers are not winning here and some are upset that Google made these changes. Here are some upset searchers:

On the other hand, this might lead to more image search traffic to publishers:

Although in the WebmasterWorld thread, one image search SEO said his pageviews are drastically down from Google Image search after the change. He wrote:

It is a bit too early to tell right now, but we will keep an eye on it.

Google also did confirm the change was related to Getty Images:

I covered this last night on Search Engine Land and it is also on Techmeme.

Forum discussion continued at WebmasterWorld and Twitter.