LLMs, links, and the death of links

Toni Cowan-Brown and Benedict Evans discuss the evolving nature of links on the internet, the Fediverse, and content distribution models. They explore the shift from open linking to closed systems like Instagram and TikTok, where recommendation algorithms drive content discovery. The conversation touches on the challenges of interoperability, the role of platforms like Substack, and the impact of AI tools like ChatGPT on content creation and consumption. They also delve into the problem of content overload and the difficulty of creating open, distributed content recommendation systems without gatekeepers or algorithms, ultimately concluding that users must accept sampling content rather than attempting to consume everything.