The web is being redesigned for AI.
asserted
web → redesign → AI
What does that mean for human readers?
asserted
that → mean → readers
Less human traffic means ads and subscription revenue may no longer fund content
Deb Perelman has seen a lot of change online.
uncertain
Perelman → mean → change
The food blogger's popular site Smitten Kitchen turns 20 years old this summer.
asserted
site → turn → ?
"I've always had the philosophy that I would just meet people where they were," Perelman said, which is why she established a presence on social media platforms from Twitter to Instagram to TikTok — but always took readers back to the recipes and stories on her website.
asserted
she → have → website
Now, she faces a new challenge: AI summaries.
asserted
she → face → challenge
Perelman said she's seen "a summary or a chunk of my own recipe in the AI blurb that you have in the top of search results.
asserted
you → say → results
"
"It's honestly shocking to me that somebody can publish my work ... without my permission," said Perelman, who is now pursuing AI-limiting protections for her site.
asserted
who → publish → site
Google recently reimagined the search box for the first time in 25 years, with "AI Mode," a conversational back-and-forth that's similar to using ChatGPT or other AI chatbots.
asserted
that → reimagine → ChatGPT
This Google function has surpassed a billion monthly users.
asserted
function → surpass → users
Beyond that, Google is also prioritizing extensive AI summaries over links to websites — the result being that people increasingly don't need to leave Google's main page to get an answer.
asserted
people → prioritize → answer
Similarly, you can rely on Claude, ChatGPT or other LLM chatbots to provide answers, recommend products or take on more complex tasks, like creating an itinerary for a trip.
asserted
you → rely → trip
It's convenient, but it means big challenges for site creators who rely on human traffic.
asserted
who → mean → traffic
The web is being fundamentally reoriented to accommodate the bots that scrape websites for the information we seek.
asserted
we → reorient → information
Websites for machines as well as humans
Human web traffic is declining.
asserted
traffic → decline → machines
Data from Cloudflare, a U.S. company that provides a range of internet services for websites and apps, found declines in human traffic across retail, software, IT and finance websites.
asserted
that → provide → websites
Some hardest hit categories declined by up to 40 per cent between June 2025 and April 2026.
asserted
categories → hit → June
"The biggest impact is … machines going to read your content," said Hamzah Khadim, co-founder of Toronto-based internet marketing service Logik Digital.
asserted
Khadim → go → Digital
Khadim argues that as search has moved "from keywords to conversations," the main goal for any website is not turning up in a list of links but being part of an AI's answer.
asserted
goal → argue → answer
Logik Digital has long specialized in SEO (search engine optimization), so that websites turn up in search results, but it's now also focused on GEO (generative engine optimization).
asserted
it → specialize → GEO
That means adding specific information that both indicates a site's credibility and answers the questions a user is likely to ask AI.
asserted
user → mean → AI
Sometimes, that means adding a lot of text to a website — for example, in its "About Us" section.
asserted
that → mean → section
"People aren't gonna necessarily read all of that, but AI definitely will
asserted
AI → go → that
," Khadim said.
asserted
Khadim → say → ?
"And it'll help establish trust."
Getting paid for content and for the cost of scraping
While many independent content creators monetize their content on social media apps, through moves like brand partnerships, a lot of websites rely on selling ads or subscriptions to fund their content.
asserted
lot → help → content
So what happens if website visitors are AI bots and not humans?
asserted
visitors → happen → ?
Mark Surman, the president of Mozilla, best known for the Firefox browser, is concerned that "if those incentives to create original, creative, independent content disappear, does content just come from big and powerful companies, or from governments, or from AI itself?
asserted
content → know → AI
"
Even if a publisher is content to let AI have content for free and doesn't rely on advertising, there are real costs associated with AI accessing web content.
asserted
AI → let → content
Wikipedia is one of the most-visited websites in the world.
asserted
Wikipedia → visit → world
Lane Becker is president of Wikimedia Enterprise, which makes Wikipedia content accessible to organizations at scale.
asserted
content → make → scale
From an access-to-information perspective, Becker is enthusiastic about AI spreading Wikipedia's content.
asserted
AI → spread → content
Wikipedia articles are free for anyone to access, but the server infrastructure providing that content costs Wikipedia (or any website) a tiny bit of money.
asserted
infrastructure → access → money
The sheer volume of requests from bots means that can really add up.
asserted
that → mean → bots
Becker says just one bot can click on 50 articles in under a second.
asserted
bot → say → second
"It's easy for one robot to show up and say, 'Hey, I want to scoop every single page out of every single Wikipedia [edition] and every single language, and I'm going to do it in under half an hour.
asserted
I → show → hour
"
So Wikimedia Enterprise has deals with a number of AI companies — including Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Meta — to pay for direct, bulk access to Wikipedia's data.
asserted
Enterprise → have → data
A new deal for the AI-native web
Other media companies may start pushing back, too, if the decline in web traffic continues.
uncertain
decline → start → traffic
According to reporting by the Wall Street Journal, Reddit and some other prominent publishers are considering cutting off or changing their relationship with Google.
uncertain
Reddit → accord → Google
USA Today's CEO recently said the "traditional Google search business model is dead … that traffic is declining … so we are going to be in a position soon where we have to block Google."
asserted
we → say → Google
He seemed to signal a willingness to forego showing up in Google search results at all.
asserted
He → seem → results
…and 3 more, not listed.
The Aporia
