The AI ​​is bleeding traffic on Google (and the great victims of bleeding are the “publishers”)

Since the mid -2000s, the so -called «Link Economy» has invariably carried the baton of traffic born from the bowels of the network network. Under the “Economy Link”, the “publishers” generate optimized content for search engines and change Google entertains with traffic to the websites of those “publishers.” Thanks to the traffic generated by Google, the “publishers” increase the number of visits and are also in a position to convert merely casual readers into faithful readers. However, The frank entry into the scene of the generative AI threatens to make the “Economy Link” jump through the air.

With the landing of the “AI Overview” function in Google (and even more with the recent introduction of “AI Mode” in the famous search engine) Links are definitely going to the background on the Internet. As long as the new functions of Google are able to provide the user direct and concise responses to their consultations, it is not necessary to click on any link, which is translating into a significant decrease in the traffic generated by the Internet giant that is affecting above all and first of all the “publishers”.

The traffic that Google directs to media as HuffPost, The Washington Post y Business Insider has suffered a collapse of more than 30% in the last three yearsaccording to similar data from which echoes The Wall Street Journal.

Y The fall in traffic generated by Google is eventually causing dismissals. Business Insider He recently announced 21% of his template. Only in the United States one in ten journalists has lost their job in recent years, according to the North American country’s labor statistics office.

In response to collapse in traffic generated by Google, The “publishers” are working on the forge of more direct relationships with their readers by sending “newsletters” and the celebration of events (Two strategies for which they were betting in any case long before the generative AI entered the scene).

Towards a new Internet ecosystem?

“We want to develop new strategies,” explains Nicholas Thompson, CEO of The Atlanticin statements to The Wall Street Journal. In this American publication, which simultaneously has a printed version and another online, they already work on the assumption that the traffic generated by Google will be sooner rather than absolutely void.

The search engines and searches emanated (which are translated in the dessert in traffic) have so far been a lucrative business for the “publishers” and also for restaurants and other local businesses. However, who has won the most thanks to the “Link Economy” has undoubtedly been Google, whose shares have glued a 7,000% jump since the Mountain View company debuted in the stock market in 2004.

Google’s leadership in the field of searches, which has been absolutely incontestable for more than two decades, is currently on the tightrope. After all, even the one who has the vitola to be the world’s greatest search engine needs something to seek to subsist. And the summaries with AI that generate functions such as “ai overView” are still strongly at the mercy of the content generated by the “publishers”. However, if the traffic that the “publishers” generate with the invaluable Google continues in free fall, many means could make the determination to literally keep their contents, raise payment walls and completely block the spiders of the search engines.

It goes without saying that all this means not only a sharp turn in the patterns by which traffic born to the heat of the network of networks has been governed so far, but also A complete revolution in the way that has been operating Internet to date.