Opinion: Can Google give AI answers without breaking the Web?

A Google sign in Mountain View, where the company campus is located, in Calif., on May 2, 2024. Google’s plans to incorporate new AI into its search results could be a problem for publishers that count on traffic from the search engine. — The New York Times

SAN FRANCISCO: For the past year and a half since ChatGPT was released, a scary question has hovered over the heads of major online publishers: What if Google decides to overhaul its core search engine to feature generative artificial intelligence more prominently – and breaks our business in the process?

The question speaks to one of the most fragile dependencies in today’s online media ecosystem.