> For decades, robots.txt governed the behavior of web crawlers. But as unscrupulous AI companies seek out more and more data, the basic social contract of the web is falling apart.
The basic social contract of the web fell apart long ago when almost everyone decided that Google was the only search engine worth serving and started aggressively blocking other crawlers.
The basic social contract of the web fell apart long ago when almost everyone decided that Google was the only search engine worth serving and started aggressively blocking other crawlers.