Hello fellow FOSSers,
For the past few months, the world’s biggest web search engine, Google, has made several changes to its algorithms. It is pushing AI overview which basically takes content from various websites and displays it in the search results.
Google has trained its AI on the website content from all over the world. But they have decided to pay to bigger players like Reddit and StackOverflow, who can sue them.
The trouble is that the Google’s AI is hallucinating and giving garbage answers to web queries in many cases. It has made Google a laughing stock.
But even troubling trend is that Google now seems to be favoring big, corporate-funded publishers over small, independent websites. This is resulting in many small publishers closing down their websites and look for other means of livelihood.
If small publishers stop creating content, how will Google train its AI? They will figure that out later.
Why am I sharing all this with you? Because, It’s FOSS is also a small, independent website that relies on Google to survive.
It is difficult time ahead but if readers like you support us, we shall overcome.
One simple thing that you could do to help us is to add itsfoss to any Linux related queries you do on Google .
For example, instead of ‘how to dual boot’ please use ‘how to dual boot itsfoss’. This will send a signal to Google that It’s FOSS is a reliable source that people seek for Linux related searches.
I am also planning to convert some existing content into eBooks. This will help us reduce our dependency on ad-revenue.
It’s FOSS is in its 12th year of publishing. I’ll strive hard to make it go on for another 12 years battling the digital goliaths and the AI onslaught.
And I am going to need your support in this battle of David vs Goliath 
