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Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

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Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#161

Post by tshaddox »

supriyo-biswas wrote: post #130
tshaddox wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to me like the options will be 1) publish free content on your website and make zero money because it will get crawled and displayed to readers elsewhere or 2) publish content on your website behind a paywall and make zero money because no one will pay for it (even if they could somehow find it, which they couldn’t).

The freemium model (similar to what Substack is doing) may work for some bloggers and news and news-adjacent publications. For regular tech bloggers such as the ones you see posted on HN, I agree it’s desperate.

> may work for some bloggers and news and news-adjacent publications

Yes, for creators who have managed to establish an audience that had high intent to consume that creator’s content. But good luck to people who are trying to make money just by delivering useful niche content where the consumers don’t even know of the creator.

Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#162

Post by brookst »

ipaddr wrote: post #88
brookst wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are viewers the only way to make a living? It wasn't always that way.

It was always this way. If no one buys your paper you shutdown writers have no jobs and stop writing. If no one buys your book same deal. What era are you referring to?

If that were true there would be no new writers, because nobody paid them to write their first book. In fact, most first books don't sell at all. And yet... people write.

Not everyone is 100% motivated by money. And those that are do not all need full time employment doing that work. And those that need money and employment can often generate revenue with complementary goods. And those that can't can source subscription and other revenue sources.

The idea that the current model of commercialization of writing is the only one that has ever or could ever work is really narrow thinking. Writing has two main values: 1) the ideas, and 2) the expression. Both of those have put food on the table for good writers forever, and will continue to do so. The AI panic is just from people who can't imagine the world being any different than it is at this very instant.

Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#163

Post by com2kid »

hammyhavoc wrote: post #131
com2kid wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Governments have basically subsidized energy so that it is as close as possible to free for generations now. Tons of industrial processes rely on super cheap energy, one reason China has such a powerful steel industry is because of how cheap energy is over there. Energy is one of many inputs into industrial systems, and it is a fairly commoditized one at that. Free energy doesn't mean you don't need tons of infrastru…

Whilst I don't disagree with a lot of the points you're making (they're great): ExxonMobil's operating revenue is $413.7bn USD. I'll be surprised if someone isn't getting whacked if they let the free energy genie out of the bottle. Energy isn't cheap in the UK. Far from it. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/consumer-affairs/electric-... My family lived in South Africa post-WWII because my gruncle's skin grafts wouldn…

> ExxonMobil's operating revenue is $413.7bn USD. I'll be surprised if someone isn't getting whacked if they let the free energy genie out of the bottle.

Most of ExxonMobil's revenue seems to come from oil (https://www.statista.com/statistics/1034911/exxonmobil-reven...), where as I presume free electricity would primarily impact their natural gas revenue.

Also isn't ExxonMobil one of those strange vertically integrated situations where most of their revenue comes from themselves? They drill the oil, then process it through their own plants which results in them paying themselves lots of money, but I may be mis-remembering that.

Anyway, solar is coming, wind is coming, and electric cars are coming, and no one is getting gunned down in the streets.

Heck China would love infinite free energy! So would any other country that wants completely dominate heavy industry overnight.

> Energy isn't cheap in the UK.

It has been a long time since the UK highly subsidized heavy manufacturing.

Energy prices have of course been going up everywhere, as, most people, realize cheap energy that results in dead kids and cancer for everyone was, in retrospect, really stupid.

> Furthermore, today, water reserves are a problem for the dam, and power generation was being suspended late last year due to it.

Infinite free energy would solve all water reserve problems, although it might end up being an environmental disaster near ocean shorelines...

Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#164

Post by dahwolf »

brookst wrote: post #52
dahwolf wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think AI will stop and pause as it comes across your "interesting things"? Hey look, it's enthusiast content, let's send our users directly to their website? I don't think so. It's going to be vacuumed into the big machine and nobody will visit those websites. In fairness, pretty much nobody does today.

So what? As an enthusiast am I supposed to be motivated by the page counter on my site? Besides, good writers are good writers. Would you rather read Matt Levine or some AI summary of his latest piece? I'm just not seeing the problem. IMO the whole obsession with driving clicks was silly from the get-go and destructive now. If AI does away with that, great. And if people whose sole motivation for writing was to get c…

You have a cynical view of "clicks". I'd argue that others reading the content you write is fairly important.

Because if it isn't, keep it in notepad I'd say.

Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#165

Post by penjelly »

rpastuszak wrote: post #59
mstachowiak wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree, because if Google doesn't, OpenAI et al will. The real question is how does Google balance this against the loss in advertising revenue?

Promoted links or native ad formats in AI search results would be an almost too obvious guess. Then putting advertising in whatever format LLM outputs are dressed as. My biggest fear is, abuse eg how LLMs for search can work with targeted ads, eg making you slightly prefer Coke vs. Pepsi, or One Political Brain Parasite(tm) over another.

curious what you imagine those targeted ads would look like? i agree its a scary thought, just having trouble imagining it

Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#166

Post by penjelly »

tomjen3 wrote: post #160
jameslk wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hot take: SEO is dead, content farms are done, almost no one will leave Google/Bing to read more than what it generates. I disagree. What incentive does a website have to produce content if it receives no traffic? Website owners want control over their traffic and the data too. They will wall off any search engine that doesn't give them anything in return (basically they're scrapers at that point). The search engin…

New Bing give you sources you can check and Google has extracted relevant facts for something like a decade at this point.

yes, but note those citations are sometimes hallucinations themselves.

more on topic though, people wont use bing if chatgpt/phind/etc answers well enough for them

Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#167

Post by ipaddr »

brookst wrote: post #162
ipaddr wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was always this way. If no one buys your paper you shutdown writers have no jobs and stop writing. If no one buys your book same deal. What era are you referring to?

If that were true there would be no new writers, because nobody paid them to write their first book. In fact, most first books don't sell at all. And yet... people write. Not everyone is 100% motivated by money. And those that are do not all need full time employment doing that work. And those that need money and employment can often generate revenue with complementary goods. And those that can't can source subscript…

Those positions become gated for the already rich. Only those who can afford to publish do. It's been this way throughout history. The internet changed this briefly but that may change. People are worried it will go back to what it was or worse.

Re: Google I/O: Big changes coming for SEOs with ubiquitous AI

#168

Post by escapedmoose »

rpastuszak wrote: post #153
escapedmoose wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I’m in love with you, dear farmer. (Jk, but truly a beautiful site. Every link I clicked was a delight. Your brain seems like a marvelous place.)

> dear farmer. Thanks, I've been trying to build a digital garden (or a cemetery) for some time, but with interconnected sites/articles/toys on different domains rather than a single Obsidian Publish style site. Tangent: I recently found a beautiful and extremely well structured digital garden made by Maggie Appleton ( https://maggieappleton.com ). So, now I'm just jumping between either being inspired by the amount…

Wow, that is a very well-considered and interesting site as well. Thanks for the link!
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