Over the past few years, technology has evolved into new realms that we never thought would be possible, including how we interact with the internet.
With the emergence of AI-powered tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, or even Microsoft Copilot, users are changing how they use the internet, and increasingly becoming more reliant on bite size, well-curated responses to queries rather than defaulting to traditional search engines like Google and Bing.
A former Google engineer claimed that the company had bigger fish to fry with OpenAI's "temporary prototype" search tool, SearchGPT than the antitrust ruling that deemed it an illegal monopolist in search. Interestingly, multiple studies suggest that the youthful population are using AI tools as their go-to source for information.
Even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed that he doesn't do Google searches anymore. He admitted that people have placed a high degree of trust in ChatGPT, yet it tends to hallucinate. "It should be the tech that you don't trust that much," the executive added.
Generative AI tools scrap their information from human-generated content and package it as their own with attributions tucked at the bottom of the page. However, a report suggested that top AI labs, including Google, OpenAI, and Anthropic won't be able to develop advanced AI models due to a lack of high-quality content for training.
The result? Poorly researched and misleading content. Even Reddit's co-founder Alexis Ohanian seemingly shares the same sentiments. While appearing in a recent episode of the TBPN podcast, the executive indicated that much of the internet today is dead. He indicated that it's due to the rise of bots and quasi-AI.
You all prove the point that so much of the internet is now just dead—this whole dead internet theory, right? Whether it’s botted, whether it’s quasi-AI, LinkedIn slop. Having proof of life, like live viewers and live content, is really f–king valuable to hold attention.”
Reddit co-founder, Alexis Ohanian
However, the executive shared an interesting idea that could potentially help make the internet more human:
"I think we‘ll see a next generation of social media emerge that’s verifiably human because it’s all going down in the group chats now—that is not novel tech. There’s got to be some next iteration of that, because that’s where all of us are getting our, really, best info now."
Ohanian further indicated that people are increasingly turning to apps for real human connection and interaction, with group chats notoriously becoming popular to serve this need. That said, AI has also begun infiltrating these platforms.
As it stands, the executive claims these group chats were the golden standard, but they weren't "novel tech."
Last month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman seemingly echoed similar sentiments, suggesting that the dead internet theory could become a reality within the next three years as bots and AI increasingly flood the web.
"I never took the dead internet theory that seriously, but it seems like there are really a lot of LLM-run Twitter accounts now," added Altman.
AI and bots are undoubtedly causing an unwelcome change on the internet, making it difficult for users to decipher what's real from what's fake.
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