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thewalrus.ca · picked by Petr Mišák · 53d ago

Artificial intelligence is consuming the web, the internet's collective memory is disappearing

AI summary

The article describes a crisis of the internet caused by the proliferation of artificial intelligence. Search engine Google has begun providing inaccurate information through faulty AI summaries, while the web progressively loses its function as a reliable archive of knowledge. Digital content is disappearing irreversibly—the Wayback Machine faces attacks and blockades, Disney deleted FiveThirtyEight entirely, and trusted sources like Wikipedia lose traffic as AI systems scrape their content directly.

The summary is written by AI from the source; it isn’t the newsroom’s opinion. For details, read the source.
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Tip author’s note

A big subject for reflection. That the world is changing rapidly, not just the digital realm, is something even the biggest skeptics can now see. But whether it's for the better or worse is hard to predict. Still, Pandora's box with AI has been opened, and it's up to us to make sure it turns out well.

AI questions & answers
Why did Google stop providing accurate information?

Google inserted an error-prone AI system between users and original sources. Instead of directing users to relevant pages, the AI generates summaries that often contain hallucinations and inaccuracies, making it harder to access true information.

What happened to the Wayback Machine and why does it matter?

The Wayback Machine is an archival service that preserved hundreds of billions of web snapshots over time. It serves historians, journalists, and lawyers to verify past statements and recover deleted pages. Today it faces legal battles and cyberattacks, and news organizations are blocking its crawlers due to copyright concerns.

How does artificial intelligence cause content to disappear?

AI systems directly scrape content from Wikipedia and other sources, eliminating the need for users to visit those pages. This reduces traffic, funding, and volunteer support for maintenance. Meanwhile, new content becomes buried under AI-generated slop, making it harder to find genuine information.

Questions and answers are written by AI about the topic, not taken from the source; they aren’t the newsroom’s opinion.
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  • Google37
  • Wayback Machine
  • Internet Archive
  • Wikipedia
  • FiveThirtyEight
  • Disney
  • Nate Silver
  • Sundar Pichai