It used to feel like magic. Now it can feel like a set of cheap tricks. Is the problem with Google — or with us? And is Google Search finally facing a real rival, in the form of A.I.-powered “answer engines”?

SOURCES:
- Marissa Mayer, co-founder of Sunshine; former C.E.O. of Yahoo! and vice president at Google.
- Ryan McDevitt; professor of economics at Duke University.
- Tim Hwang, media researcher and author; former Google employee.
- Elizabeth Reid, vice president of Search at Google.
- Aravind Srinivas, C.E.O. and co-founder of Perplexity.
- Jeremy Stoppelman, C.E.O. and co-founder of Yelp.

RESOURCES:
- “A Fraudster Who Just Can’t Seem to Stop … Selling Eyeglasses,” by David Segal (The New York Times, 2022).
- Subprime Attention Crisis: Advertising and the Time Bomb at the Heart of the Internet, by Tim Hwang (2020).
- “Complaint: U.S. and Plaintiff States v. Google LLC,” by the U.S. Department of Justice (2020).
- “Fake Online Locksmiths May Be Out to Pick Your Pocket, Too,” by David Segal (The New York Times, 2016).
- “‘A’ Business by Any Other Name: Firm Name Choice as a Signal of Firm Quality,” by Ryan C. McDevitt (Journal of Political Economy, 2014).
- In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives, by Steven Levy (2011).
- “The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine,” by Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page (Computer Networks and ISDN Systems, 1998).

EXTRAS:
- “Is Dialysis a Test Case of Medicare for All?” by Freakonomics Radio (2021).
- “How Big is My Penis? (And Other Things We Ask Google),” by Freakonomics Radio (2017).

Nip It In The Bud: Your Best Solution For Stopping Poor Behavior In Its Tracks