The last episode of The BOYS was released just today, and my news feed already spoiled the ending a bit.
Thanks a lot various entertainment news channels for the spoilers, and Google for that AI summary nobody asked for.
I don’t think I searched for anything related to the show. I unfortunately learned that lesson a long time ago – don’t search for TV shows or movies, or else news feeds will spoil them for you.
Unwanted news feed items ruined the new ending of MAUL for me too. I didn’t search for that either!
A Forbes article popped up in my news feed last week, spoiling that episode.
Isn’t Forbes a business magazine?
On the ToolGuyd side of things, ChatGPT crawls the site an average of around 18,000 times a DAY. Do you know how many visitors they sent over yesterday? 20. The day before? 5. The day before that? 7.
By my math, looking at numbers for the past month, they sent over 1 person for every 1542 queries.
Blocking ChatGPT didn’t do much, because they then just pull the same info from scrapers and RSS pages that knowingly or unintentionally impersonate ToolGuyd, and then link there instead.
Timeliness is an increasing pressure, with an increasing number of stories where the topics are “now or not worth it” from a pure business perspective. You’re going to see everyone scrambling to adapt to this.
It’s like the World Series, All Star Game, Superbowl, World Cup, and so forth. How many people check the score or game summary the same day? The next day? One week later?
The accuracy of AI overviews, summaries, and answers vary greatly. But whether they’re accurate or not, people are getting accustomed to AI being a stopping point.
According to Google’s AI, Dewalt’s drill from 2 generations ago is the top 3-speed hammer drill on the market.
Where are they getting this expert recommendation from?
Here’s the article thumbnail.
Oh my.
It’s a generic SEO page for a random tool store, and it reads like it was written by AI.
AI overviews and summaries are now sourcing from AI summaries.
Oh yeah – the software that ToolGuyd is built on is getting a new update today. What’s new? “AI-Integrated WordPress.”
With AI integrated throughout WordPress the potential is endless. A new AI Client in Core lets WordPress communicate with generative AI models, while connections are easily managed from a single hub in the dashboard. The AI Client combined with the Abilities API makes a fiery duo that introduces new functionality, workflow automation, and creation tools to your website. Install the new AI plugin to expand your options even more: generate and edit images, create titles or excerpts, or even suggest alt text.
Did they improve search? No. Comment features? No. Fix some of the bugs in how content is created and edited? No.
But AI is now going to be “integrated throughout WordPress.”
They built “a new AI client” in the core software, for communicating with generative AI models. Oh joy. One less step for slop creators.
AND Google just announced a “new era for AI search” where you just ask a question and a “new, intelligent AI-powered box” spits out summarized answers.
Also, “we’re entering the era of Search agents” that provide “intelligent, synthesized updates.”
I guess that will be something else to adapt to.
A lot of people are now freaking out about this, and how it could be the end of websites and YouTube. Why visit a page or watch a video anymore if AI can scrape, combine, and summarize, with sponsored shopping links right there for convenience?
I guess this is also why we’re seeing a lot more channels putting content behind paywalls.
I have also seen a lot more ads for sponsored content. Not sponsored posts, but sponsored posts leading to sponsored posts.
Interesting times.
