The internet is quickly becoming a slurry of AI-generated garbage, and Google has decided to just let us all marinate in it. Anyone online can see that Google Search is getting worse, but now it’s becoming clear why. Google News is boosting AI-generated content over real, human journalism, according to a report from 404 Media Thursday. The search giant responded by blaming the publication behind the report for being “new” and having a paywall for not showing up in Google News, though much of the article had nothing to do with 404 Media’s content.
The report highlights several publications that produce AI-generated content and appear in Google News search results. One of them, Worldtimetodays.com, published an article recently that started with, “war of stars fans,” instead of Star Wars fans, and very clearly reproduces an article from Distractify. Distractify has no paywall and is over 10 years old.
While most companies would acknowledge a mistake and move along, Google called these claims “inaccurate” in an emailed statement to Gizmodo. A spokesperson said, “The sites in question only appeared for artificially narrow queries, including queries that explicitly filtered out the date of an original article.” The queries in question were for “Star Wars theory” and “Midjourney” and the claims regarding filters can not be confirmed.
Danny Sullivan, Google’s search liaison, wrote a long, somewhat condescending thread to a 404 Media journalist on X Thursday about the finding.
“I also appreciate the frustration of a new publication like yours wanting to quickly appear in Google News,” Sullivans wrote. The representative then encouraged 404 Media to let Google’s web crawler bypass its paywall to “fully understand the work you’re doing.” The paywall only appears on a small subset of the publication’s content.
Google says it does not prioritize articles written by humans over AI-generated content in its statement on X. One reason Google might be sitting on the fence here is that the company, itself, is a large player in the generative AI world with Google Gemini.
The search giant is in an uncomfortable position here, stuck between providing good, accurate results for its users and its own AI ambitions. Tech in general is having a power struggle with the news industry at the moment, as The New York Times sues OpenAI for copyright infringement. For now, that means a lesser experience for end users, and that your search results will likely get worse before they get better.
Ideally, Google would like its own AI to answer your queries. They’re experimenting with Search Generative Experience, a pilot AI chatbot that’s built into Google Search. Google’s AI will likely be better than what we’re seeing today, but will also be informed by the work of real, human journalists, just like Worldtimetodays.com.
Another problem for Google is its lackluster search results. A study showed websites using SEO tricks to rank higher, usually for affiliate marketing purposes, were taking up top spots on product searches. Ultimately, it seems credible journalism is being crowded out by SEO-optimized, AI-generated nonsense designed to get you to buy something.