THE END OF GOOGLE SEARCH AS WE KNOW IT IS HERE

Google I/O conference just ended in its Mountain View HQ, and there is a lot to digest.

Google Search is about to undergo a major transformation, for better or worse. Driven by Alphabet-owned Google's ambitious AI vision and competition from AI innovators like ChatGPT, AI will make the company's core product more reorganized, personalized, and heavily summarized.

During Google’s annual I/O developer conference in Mountain View, California, Liz Reid unveiled these changes, marking her influence as the new head of Google Search. Reid has been with Google for 20 years and contributed to various search products. Her AI-focused demonstration highlighted a central theme of Google’s keynote, led by CEO Sundar Pichai: AI is now the foundation of nearly every Google product, and the company plans to accelerate this shift.

These changes to Google Search have been in the works for a long time. Last year, the company introduced a section in its Search Labs that allows users to try out new experimental features called the Search Generative Experience. The big question since then has been whether or when those features would become a permanent part of Google Search.

Google's search overhaul comes when critics are increasingly vocal about what some perceive as a degraded search experience. For the first time in a long while, the company feels competitive pressure, particularly from the significant partnership between Microsoft and OpenAI.

Smaller startups like Perplexity, You.com, and Brave are also gaining attention, riding the generative AI wave and reimagining the concept of search, even if they still need to capture significant mindshare.

Customized Gemni for Search

Google has developed a customized Gemini AI model for these new Search features. However, it has yet to disclose details about the model's size, speed, or the safeguards implemented around the technology.

This search-specific adaptation of Gemini will drive several elements of the new Google Search. The most notable is likely the AI Overviews, which Google has already been testing in its labs. These AI-generated summaries will now appear at the top of search results.

AI Overviews like this won’t appear for every search result, even as the feature becomes more widespread. They are reserved for more complex queries. Each time a person searches, Google makes an algorithmic value judgment behind the scenes to determine whether to provide AI-generated answers or traditional blue links to click.

AI Overviews are rolling out this week to all Google search users in the US. By the end of the year, the feature will be available in more countries.

Another update coming to search is a feature for planning. For example, you can ask Google to plan your meals or find a nearby Pilates studio offering a class with an introductory discount. In this future vision of search, an AI agent can gather information on several local studios, summarize their reviews, and estimate the time it would take to walk there. This highlights one of Google’s key advantages over newer search engines, which lack the extensive reviews, mapping data, and other resources that Google possesses and may struggle to access real-time or local information via APIs.

One of the most striking changes Google tests in its Search Labs is an "AI-organized" results page. At first glance, this eliminates the traditional blue-links search experience.

If these new AI features seem overwhelming, you might have yet to see Google's latest ambitious vision for what used to be a simple text box.

By generating AI Overviews and determining when they should appear, Google effectively decides what constitutes a complex question and which web content should inform its AI-generated summary.

While this marks a new era where the search engine does more of the work for you, it also introduces the potential for algorithmic bias toward certain types of results.

One of the most significant changes brought about by these AI models is that AI now creates an informed opinion.

For the past 20 years, the search paradigm involved the engine pulling in a wealth of information and providing links. Now, the search engine performs the searches, summarizes the results, and offers a formative opinion.

This raises the stakes for Google’s search results. When algorithms decide that users need one comprehensive answer instead of multiple links to explore, any errors become more impactful. Like other AI models, Gemini is not immune to hallucinations—instances where the AI provides blatantly incorrect or fabricated information.

10 Blue Links are Gone.

Google’s reimagined AI search further pushes the iconic "10 blue links" into the background. Initially, ads and info boxes began to dominate the top of Google’s pages; now, AI-generated overviews and categories will occupy a significant portion of the search results. This shift is causing concern among web publishers and content creators, and understandably so.

Generative AI solutions are becoming substitute answer engines, replacing user queries that previously relied on traditional search engines. This shift will force companies to rethink their marketing channel strategies, signaling a significant change in the industry landscape. Eight months ago, BrightEdge, a consulting company, developed a generative parser that monitors interactions with AI-generated results on the web. Over the past month, the parser has noticed that Google is less frequently asking users if they want an AI-generated answer—a feature of the experimental phase of generative search—and more often assuming they do.

These changes have major implications for Google’s advertising business, which accounts for most of the company’s revenue. CEO Sundar Pichai declined to share specific revenue figures from its generative AI experiments in a recent quarterly earnings call. Google has stated it will prioritize traffic to websites, creators, and merchants as these changes roll-out, but it hasn’t revealed how it plans to achieve this. When asked in a press briefing ahead of I/O if Google believes users will still click on links beyond the AI-generated summary, the response was unclear. Previously, searchers had to navigate multiple websites to find the desired information. Now, Google will compile answers from various sites of its choosing. Despite these changes, Google believes this approach will still encourage user exploration.

As we stand on the brink of this new era in search technology, it's clear that integrating AI into search engines like Google will bring about profound changes. While these advancements promise a more streamlined and personalized search experience, they also raise important questions about transparency, bias, and the future of online content creation. As we navigate these uncharted waters, users, creators, and companies must stay informed and adaptable. The evolution of search is inevitable, and how we respond to these changes will shape the digital landscape for years.