Why the internet is feeling a little fake lately

Reddit recently expressed frustration with Google’s new search feature called AI Overviews, which uses artificial intelligence to summarize web pages directly on the search results screen. Instead of giving users a list of blue links to click and visit—the traditional way to navigate the web—Google is now providing its own automated answer. Reddit’s leadership argues this keeps people away from real human discussions and first-hand experiences, which are the site's primary value. Meanwhile, the music industry is grappling with tracks like the song Rubberz by Fenix Flexin, which climbed the Billboard charts despite widespread suspicion that it was created by AI. Experts point to telltale signs, such as strange, nonsensical lyrics, digital distortions in the sound, and a lack of rhythmic flow, suggesting it was produced by a computer model.

Generative AI models are essentially massive, sophisticated prediction engines. They are trained by analyzing enormous libraries of existing human content, like millions of songs or billions of web pages. When you ask them to create something new, they don't "think"; they calculate the most statistically likely sequence of words, notes, or images to follow your prompt. The problems we are seeing happen because these models are trained on low-quality data or compressed files. For music, this results in "artifacts"—small, jagged errors in the sound where the machine failed to correctly replicate human nuance. For writing, the model might produce a rhyme scheme that sounds perfect on the surface but contains no actual narrative or meaning, because the machine is focused on the pattern of rhyming rather than the purpose of the story.

We are currently in a tug-of-war between the convenience of automated content and the human need for genuine connection. If search engines summarize everything for us, websites like Reddit lose the visitors they need to survive. If AI-generated music fills the charts, it risks drowning out human artists who have spent years honing their craft. As these tools get smarter, the question isn't whether the technology is impressive, but whether it can replace the messy, imperfect, and deeply human context that gives our culture its value. We are learning that while AI can easily mimic the shape of a song or a search result, it hasn't yet figured out how to be interesting.