How AI is reshaping the internet, cybersecurity, and work

Executive overview

The internet's core business model — create content, drive traffic, sell ads — is breaking. AI has made it 50x harder to get traffic from Google than a decade ago, and thousands of times harder from AI platforms. Google hoards the data advantage that will define the next era, while AI companies wait for Google to move first on paying for content.

The winner of the AI era will be whoever controls access to unique, irreplaceable data — and that reshapes everything from media to cybersecurity to employment.

The internet traffic crisis and Google's data monopoly

• Google sees 5x more pages than Bing; OpenAI sees 1 page for every 3.5 Google sees
• Getting traffic from Anthropic is 65,000x harder than from Google a decade ago
• AI platforms summarise content instead of sending users to it — destroying the ad-driven model
• AI companies won't pay for content until Google does; Google has no incentive to start
• Google's rational move: lock up semi-exclusive deals with the most valuable content before rivals can

A path to a media renaissance

• Reddit earned 7x what the New York Times got per token — because Reddit has no substitute
• Local, hyper-specific information (restaurant reviews, room-level hotel data) is now disproportionately valuable to AI
• AI rewards factual depth over engagement-bait; could shift publishing incentives away from outrage
• Journalists' raw notes and source material may become a new licensing asset class
• Prince's local Utah newspaper may earn more from AI licensing than digital ads this year

Cyber war on the front lines

• Iranian attacks spiked 7x on February 27th, then dropped to under 10% of baseline after US/Israeli strikes disrupted command and control
• Cyber typically stays elevated throughout physical conflict; Iran broke that pattern
• Russian attacks increased during Israel-Hamas conflict, disguised as Iranian or Hamas activity
• AI has compressed attacker dwell time from days to hours or minutes after initial access
• Good actors have more data than bad actors — the long-run advantage goes to defenders

The electric screwdriver divide

• Workers aged 25–40 face the highest displacement risk: too experienced to be AI-native, too junior to be protected
• The 100x productivity gap between AI-native and AI-resistant employees is not sustainable within one team
• Cloudflare is hiring 1,111 interns partly to teach senior staff — reversing the traditional mentorship direction
• An AI agent now checks every configuration change at Cloudflare before it ships — a role no human hire could fill
• Companies using AI as a layoff excuse and companies in genuine transformation both exist; executives should be honest about which camp they're in

The future of brand and small business

• Brands are shortcuts for human judgment — agent-driven commerce doesn't need those shortcuts
• Agents optimise for efficiency and will default to large, consolidated suppliers unless trust signals are made machine-readable
• Cloudflare is working with Visa, PayPal, and Shopify to build cryptographically verifiable customer-satisfaction signals for agents
• Small businesses built on physical convenience or emotional loyalty face structural risk in an agent-mediated economy
• The open question for the next five years: what is the internet's business model, and what does a brand mean to an agent?