Google Poised to Grab Even More of Info Market With New Search Experience

The latest article from futurism.com tells about the alarm bells going off over Google’a new idea for a search engine. In the article, Maggie Harrison reveals something about Google that by now everybody knows. AI search engines are trained with machine learning. Meaning the algorithm absorbs millions of pieces of data over and over again. The algorithm remembers it, then produces it in a compacted answer when you ask Google any question. This seems forgotten by internet publishers who feel Google will wipe them out. Here is the problem according to Harrison.

At its annual I/O in San Francisco this week, Google finally revealed its plans for AI-integrated search — which excludes digital publishers.

“Google’s new AI-powered search interface, ‘Search Generative Experience,’ or SGE for short, involves a feature called ‘AI Snapshot.’ It’s an enormous top-of-the-page summarization feature. Ask, for example, ‘Why is sourdough bread still so popular?’ — one of the examples that Google used in their presentation — and, before you get to the blue links that we’re all familiar with, Google will provide you with a large language model (LLM) -generated summary. Or, we guess, snapshot.”

We actually Googled that question about sourdough bread and it yielded 25,500,000 responses in .59 seconds—very impressive indeed.

Concerns over SGE

The number of ways people make money using the internet is limitless. Many of them involve the traffic that comes to their site. And getting people to their site is what search engines like Google do.  Publishers say it feels like Google is giving its opinion about some sites and directing traffic to a competitor more beneficial to Google.

Media publishers on the web get money by getting clicks for different writers who cover the subjects of the world. Anywhere on the web, you can find international information already written for you to consume. That is precisely what Google does already. Now it’s going to do it even faster.

“If this actually works and is implemented in a firm way,” wrote RPG Site owner Alex Donaldson, “this is literally the end of the business model for vast swathes of digital media lol.”

Various internet media companies say that Google will devour their content and not compensate them or the writers that composed the material.

“Google has unveiled its vision for how it will incorporate AI into search,” tweeted The Verge’s James Vincent. “The quick answer: it’s going to gobble up the open web and then summarize/rewrite/regurgitate it (pick the adjective that reflects your level of disquiet) in a shiny Google UI.”

Snapshot Is Quick & Easy

Because research shows people rarely make it to the second page of Google results, the company is likely seeking to put as much information as possible in as little space as possible, using its AI to do it cheaply.  Google didn’t answer a specific question on whether it plans to compensate digital publishers.

“We don’t have plans to share on this, but we’ll continue to work with the broader ecosystem,” the spokesperson told Futurism.

Even though Microsoft has made some headlines recently with the Bing Chatbot, it is clear Google is the big dog in search engines.  And with the new AI, it will incorporate, it appears Google will remain the big dog for some time to come.

read more at futurism.com