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Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

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Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#11
post #6

Anyone surprised? I mean that's just what Google does and did from the very early days. I am more ashamed that politicians worldwide have done basically nothing to help media companies in the last 25 years. We can always ask ourselves: What is more important for our society: independent media or our search overlords?

Why should they help media companies?

Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#12
I think that requiring PoW (proof-of-work) could take over for simple requests, rejecting requests until a sufficient nonce is included in the request. Unfortunately, this collective PoW could burden power grids even more, wasting energy+money+computation for transmission. Such is life. It would be a lot better to just upgrade the servers, but that's never going to be sufficient.

Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#14

Honest question as I try to wrap my millennial brain around this -- for those of you who search for news -- with or without an AI -- what are you searching for? So much of news is finding out the unknown, it seems unsearchable by nature? Or are you asking for updates to a specific, ongoing story?

Generally, if I'm manually searching for news, it's either to get more information about something I heard from someone (searching by the event), or to see if news has been published about something nearby (searching by region).

Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#15
post #6

Anyone surprised? I mean that's just what Google does and did from the very early days. I am more ashamed that politicians worldwide have done basically nothing to help media companies in the last 25 years. We can always ask ourselves: What is more important for our society: independent media or our search overlords?

> politicians worldwide have done basically nothing to help media companies Is that really surprising? Good journalists consider it their job to hold politicians accountable.

but that cuts both ways. They hold not only your own party accountable but also the other parties. Thus, if you are a politican that has a moral compass and believe you are the one who does the best job, then you would like a well-respected media organisation because you would think that it hits the other guys more often than yourself.

But yes.. this only works so long as the amount of politicans with a moral compass are a majority... the moment this changes is the moment that the media is the enemy.

Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#16
post #11
post #6

Anyone surprised? I mean that's just what Google does and did from the very early days. I am more ashamed that politicians worldwide have done basically nothing to help media companies in the last 25 years. We can always ask ourselves: What is more important for our society: independent media or our search overlords?

Why should they help media companies?

[flagged]

Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#17
post #11
post #6

Anyone surprised? I mean that's just what Google does and did from the very early days. I am more ashamed that politicians worldwide have done basically nothing to help media companies in the last 25 years. We can always ask ourselves: What is more important for our society: independent media or our search overlords?

Why should they help media companies?

I think that’s a good question. If they did their jobs properly, acting as the 4th estate, then I’d be much more supportive.

However the last action I can remember that fulfilled checks and counterbalances was the publication of the Snowden files. After that the press died and it’s never recovered.

Journalists are too scared and media companies neutered, and no longer have what it takes to call out the executive.

Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#19

Honest question as I try to wrap my millennial brain around this -- for those of you who search for news -- with or without an AI -- what are you searching for? So much of news is finding out the unknown, it seems unsearchable by nature? Or are you asking for updates to a specific, ongoing story?

Sometimes I look for a specific old article. Search is completely useless for this since it usually ignores what I'm searching for to show me more about whatever is recent.

Re: Chatbots are replacing Google's search, devastating traffic for some publishers

#20
post #17
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should they help media companies?

I think that’s a good question. If they did their jobs properly, acting as the 4th estate, then I’d be much more supportive. However the last action I can remember that fulfilled checks and counterbalances was the publication of the Snowden files. After that the press died and it’s never recovered. Journalists are too scared and media companies neutered, and no longer have what it takes to call out the executive.

I mean Fox News seemed to be pretty darn good at calling out Biden and made it their personal mission to hate everything Obama touched. Why aren't people comfortable calling out Trump? Because he's made it clear he will and has retaliated against anyone who does.

We've implicitly relied on the "courtesy" of the executive to just sit there and take it for the good of the country and public discussion. But now that time seems to have passed. No more high road and turning the other cheek.

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