The Impact of AI Search on the Online Content Ecosystem: Evidence from Google and Reddit
Search engines traditionally complement online content platforms by directing users seeking information to external websites. The emergence of generative AI search tools that summarize answers directly on the results page may disrupt this relationship by making visits to source platforms optional. We study this question using Google AI Overviews and Reddit, one of the largest online discussion platforms. Our identification exploits Google's content moderation policy: Safe-for-Work (SFW) Reddit communities are indexed by Google organic search and surfaced in Google AI Overviews, while Not-Safe-for-Work (NSFW) communities, though indexed by organic search, are prohibited from being referenc...
| Authors | Peibo Zhang, Ruomeng Cui, Dennis J. Zhang |
|---|---|
| Primary category | cs.IR |
| Published | 14 May 2026 |
| Last updated at source | 11 October 2026 |
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