"The stomach-dropping moments are easy to pinpoint: copyright hell thanks to AI engines' unscrupulous scraping, and the erosion of referral traffic - largely caused by the emerging competitive AI search landscape. Adaptability stopped being a nice-to-have for publishers years ago; it became a survival skill. The difference now is that the muscle they built just to stay alive may finally work in their favor in 2026."
"Here are some of the moments that defined how publishers adapted to the AI era this year. As 2025 winds down, we rounded up the biggest trends of the year, based on the data that resonated the most with Digiday's readers. Publishers want a fair, structured, regulated AI environment and they also want to define what the next decade of audience metrics looks like."
2025 delivered major disruptions for publishers, driven by AI engines scraping content and an emerging competitive AI search landscape that eroded referral traffic. Copyright infringement concerns and declining referral sources pressured publishers’ business models and highlighted the limits of ad-only revenue. Publishers increasingly experimented with licensing, curation, traffic strategies, and enterprise LLM deals while reassessing monetization mixes. Adaptability evolved from a desirable trait into an essential survival skill, and the operational resilience built over prior upheavals may enable stronger positioning in 2026. Publishers seek a fair, structured, regulated AI environment and aim to redefine audience metrics for the next decade.
Read at Digiday
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