For nearly three decades, the web was built on a simple routine: websites published content freely, search engines organized that content and, in exchange, drove traffic, generating visibility, business, and ad revenue. This dynamic formed what we call the "open web."

But the balance is shifting. The rise of artificial intelligence, the integration of directly-generated answers in search engines, and the prioritization of closed ecosystems are reshaping the digital space. Google, which for years symbolized the very idea of free access to information, today finds itself at the center of this transformation and, in some ways, is steering it.

In this article, we explore how the new internet is taking shape, who is gaining (or losing) ground, and what creators, businesses, and users can do in the face of this change.

What is the open web

The open web is the principle that sustained the growth of the modern internet:
an open, decentralized, and accessible space where anyone can publish, research, and share information freely.

It was this model that allowed the emergence of millions of independent sites, blogs, forums, and media outlets, all interconnected by links and search engines. The value was in discovery: browsing the web meant exploring, clicking, comparing, and diving deeper.

This freedom created diversity, innovation, and a sense of collective authorship. Every site, no matter how small, could be found, read, and cited.

But the rise of artificial intelligence is beginning to alter this very link: the one connecting those who create with those who access.

The role of AI answers and the drop in clicks

The first major visible change is how we interact with search.

Before, the experience was simple: you asked a question, read the results, and chose where to click. Now, with AI Overviews (automatic summaries generated by Google's AI), the answer appears ready-made, directly on the search results page, and the need to visit the original websites is drastically reduced.

Recent research shows that when an AI-generated answer appears at the top, the average number of clicks on external links drops significantly. The user gets the information without leaving the search page.

This represents a structural shift. The attention model that sustained a large part of the internet, the click, is being replaced by the answer model, where information no longer belongs to a specific domain but is synthesized from thousands of sources.

The result is a less navigable and more "summarized" internet, where users stop exploring and merely consume. And this raises an important question: how to keep the web alive if no one visits the sites that build it anymore?

Who loses and who wins

In any technological transformation, there are winners and losers — and the transition from the open web to the mediated web is no exception.

Large portals and media conglomerates tend to survive better because they have direct agreements with Google, bargaining power, and teams dedicated to SEO and AI. On the other hand, independent sites, technical blogs, and niche content producers face the most severe impact: they drop positions, lose relevance, and see their original work diluted into automated summaries.

Specialized publications, like HouseFresh, have been denouncing that expert content is being replaced by generic articles from major media brands, which produce texts "optimized for the algorithm" and not necessarily useful or accurate.

The new attention economy

The change also goes through the economy.

What mattered before was the click; now, what matters is the context. Platforms that dominate the search and recommendation interface (like Google, YouTube, and even ChatGPT) now define what is seen, what is cited, and what is ignored.

This creates a new visibility funnel:

• Original content is produced (usually by independents);

• The AI processes, summarizes, or partially cites it.

• The user consumes the summary and rarely returns to the source.

In this cycle, the value of creation shifts: whoever controls the point of contact gets to capture the value that was previously distributed among thousands of creators. It is the same pattern we saw happen with music (streaming), journalism (social networks), and now with information in general.

Read also: 7 AI trends that will transform the economy in 2026

The impact for companies and brands

Companies that depend on organic traffic, content marketing, and SEO are already feeling the effects. What used to be a solid strategy (ranking well on Google) now needs to be rethought.

This does not mean that content has lost value, but that the method of delivery has changed. Users still search for information, but increasingly within closed, AI-assisted environments, whether Google, Copilot, Perplexity, ChatGPT, or Gemini.

The brands that survive in this new scenario will be those that:

• Build brand authority, so that the audience searches for them directly.

• Explore their own channels, such as newsletters, communities, and podcasts.

• Adapt to produce structured content for AI, with metadata, clarity, and relevance.

What creators, companies, and users can do

Faced with the transition to a web increasingly mediated by algorithms and agents, there are concrete paths for adaptation:

• Strengthen your direct relationship with your audience. Encourage sign-ups, subscriptions, and your own communication channels.

• Create content with real purpose. Generic articles will be disposable on a web filtered by AI.

• Use AI to your advantage. Automation, optimization, and generation tools can scale your production, as long as they maintain authenticity.

• Diversify your digital presence. Being in multiple ecosystems (LinkedIn, YouTube, Reddit, newsletters) reduces dependence on a single channel.

• Educate your audience. Explain the importance of accessing original sources; the open web only survives if people keep exploring it.

A new cycle

It is no exaggeration to say that we are experiencing the biggest inflection point of the internet since the emergence of smartphones.

The open web — democratic, navigable, and collaborative — is giving way to an assisted web, where users delegate decisions to AI and receive instantaneous answers.

This transformation has clear benefits (efficiency, accessibility, personalization), but also profound losses (diversity, autonomy, and transparency). The challenge now is to find a balance: leverage the power of AI without allowing it to close the doors of the network that made it possible.

More than a technological change, this is a behavioral change:

1. We search less, we receive more. Users stop exploring and start being guided by ready-made answers.

2. We produce more, we discover less. The abundance of content does not guarantee visibility, and AI chooses what to show.

3. We trust platforms more, and navigation less. The open journey of the web gives way to the filtered experience of assistants.

The future of the internet can — and must — continue to be plural, human, and open.

But this will depend on conscious choices: from companies that prioritize transparency, from creators who defend authorship, and from users who remain curious enough to click, explore, and discover.
Part of the magic of the internet has always been casual discovery: stumbling upon an incredible article, finding a different idea, following links until arriving at an unexpected place. With the rise of ready-made answers and closed environments, this feature is disappearing. And perhaps preserving this exploratory spirit is the most important step to keeping the web truly open.