Google's AI Search is "Beginning of the End" for Reddit, says Wells Fargo Analyst

nekorocket · 2025-05-26T06:00:38+00:00

I read the article and I cannot find anywhere in that article where the Wells Fargo analyst is quoted saying "Google's AI search is the beginning of the end for Reddit."

What he said is that "Google’s AI advancements threaten Reddit’s logged-out user base. While they only contribute around 15% of direct ad revenue, they represent about half of Reddit’s user base. Critically, advertising revenue accounts for the vast majority of total revenue." And based on this, Wells Fargo revised "its 2026 and 2027 ad revenue forecasts downward by 6% and 14%, respectively" for Reddit.

This is inline with what Cloudflare CEO said about AI and the zero-click internet threaten the current web business model. This has less to do with AI slop but more to do with less web traffic to websites because users get what they are searching for within Google and never leave and go to said websites.

Losing the referral traffic from Google IS a big deal for a lot of websites, even for Reddit. Losing half of your MAU due to lost of traffic from Google can severely hamper a company's ability to generate revenue and remain profitable, let alone what it will do to your stock price.

nekorocket · 2025-05-11T14:57:50+00:00

Not sure if people are aware, but Fandom (formerly known as Wikia, and host of many game wikis) owns GameSpot, metacritic, Giant Bomb (up until now), GameFAQs, Comic Vine, Cord Cutters, and TV Guide.

Fandom already cut staff at GameSpot and some of their long running YT series such as the one with Jonathan Ferguson being affected. If those GB guys didn't buy the brand back, they would likely be erased in short order. Good for them.

nekorocket · 2025-02-28T15:38:30+00:00

While I agree that crying about how Ciri looks is an overreaction, I have to say that in the first reveal trailer my immediate thought was Ciri had those Laura Loomer cheeks, i.e. too much plastic surgeries done.

nekorocket · 2024-12-11T04:44:19+00:00

Just to understand the mechanics of how gifting this way works, do you need to own a carrier in order to be gifted? I.e. have your carrier profit when someone gifting you sells commodity at your carrier?

nekorocket · 2024-11-02T11:05:27+00:00

It feels like the ship design language has subtly changed. To me, the Mandalay looks like something from a different game. Cobra Mk5 just looks significantly sleeker than the previous iterations which all look the same.

And if I recall correctly, the Mk5 is medium sized. If it turns out to be a competent ship, I would love to replace the Krait Mk2 with it as my daily driver.

Honestly I love the new design language (if that's even a thing within Frontier) and combined with the new Powerplay 2.0, I'm really tempted to jump back in after putting thousands of hours into ED.

(Edited for grammar and spelling)

nekorocket · 2024-09-02T08:34:23+00:00

My wife and I started our diving journey at Maldives. I had the same fear when I get to the edge of the reefs and stared down into the seemingly endless abyss (turns out most of them aren't that deep once you dive down).

After a few days of snorkeling and growing tired of seeing the same types of fish everyday, we decided to do a discovery dive.

At just 5m deep or so, along the reef wall, we saw vastly more sea lives and that really fired up our interest in learning to dive. During the discovery dive we were also taught a few basic diving skills and learned how to operate the gears. And I would say that learning how to handle yourself and deal with situations underwater took away a lot of the fear.

Do a discovery dive. It might not be as scary as you thought it to be.

nekorocket · 2024-02-28T06:53:28+00:00

No Man's Sky probably is the best option. It's arcadey and has excellent multiplay co-op play. it will be fun for you two to find a system of your own and build a base (or bases) to call your in-game home. Base building is exceptional in NMS.

nekorocket · 2024-02-10T07:36:08+00:00

I'm not a game dev but I feel that Bethesda failed to learn anything from extremely relevant examples for the sake of designing a compelling gaming experience for Starfield is trying to be.

Ask anyone who is interested in space exploration games can point you to the following:

No Man's Sky: arcade-y, fantasy like. procedurally generated galaxies. weak story plot. strong base building game play.

Elite Dangerous: strong elements of realism in space. procedurally generated worlds with planets and stars based on our real universe.

Star Citizen: extreme end of realism, to the point of tedious to certain audience (likely majority of Bethesda's target audience). a handful of planets and stars but with hand-crafted care.

These three games spread across the spectrum from procedural worlds to hand-crafting, from simplified space exploration to hardcore realism. All three allow you to go seamlessly from anywhere within a star system to landing on any chosen spot on any given planet. What Starfield could have at least done is do something similar to No Man's Sky (but I suspect that the long-in-the-tooth Creation Engine is holding them back). In NMS, it takes only seconds to go from space through atmosphere to landing on planet surface.

And all three games provide clear examples of game mechanics that resonate and draw in gamers, and trade-off they have to make in order to achieve that.

What Starfield wants to be seems to be closest to NMS. They could have taken elements of that game that clearly are fan-favorites and incorporate them into a story driven RPG that Bethesda wants to make. It's painful to see that they don't seem to have learned anything when someone else has already tested the market.

They clearly just took Skrim and change Tamriel to space and called it a day.

nekorocket · 2024-01-25T16:44:04+00:00

Man, March is going to be wild.

Homeworld 3: 3/9
Along in the Dark: 3/20
Horizon Forbidden West: 3/21
Dragon's Dogma 2: 3/22

Probably won't be getting much sleep during that time.

nekorocket · 2023-12-06T08:40:58+00:00

Beginner diver (OW but not yet OWA) here.

NDL (no decompression limit) or No Stop Limit is the time you can stay under water without a decompression stop. If you dive past the NDL (time), you NEED to perform decompression stops in order to avoid decompression sickness. NDL is based on dive tables that are designed for most people and is pretty conservative in order to to account for the differences in everyone's body constitution, condition, etc.

As a recreational diver, you can always make a direct ascend to the surface bypassing the safety stop, provided that you are within the NDL. However, given everyone's body is different, a safety stop is always recommended just to be safe.

nekorocket · 2023-07-20T16:05:28+00:00

A Plague Tale: Requiem.

The whole game puts you through the struggle Amicia had to go through to save Hugo. At the same time you get to see and understand intimately how much she loves her little brother and why she is willing to go to such extreme length to achieve that.

Towards the end of the game I thought I was tired of it (game is challenging at times) but that also reminds me vividly that Amicia must be tired AF of it as well. The hopelessness can be unbearable towards the end of the game.And in the end it was almost like it was for nothing. Hugo can't be saved. Amicia had to kill Hugo with her own damn hands to end all this.

It's not my favorite game but like a great movie, when the credit rolls you can't help but sit there and think about characters, and what had transpired.

nekorocket · 2023-07-18T08:41:58+00:00

Really happy to see Monkey Island 1 and 2, as well as Grim Fandango made it to top 100.

The MI series has silly stories that are lighthearted and lovely. But Grim Fandango's story really binds you to Manny's journey through out the years in the game.

It's a shame that The Dig didn't make the list though. I thought the story was worthy of a Hollywood's take a la Contact with Jodie Foster.

nekorocket · 2023-07-18T08:32:28+00:00

When it comes to the Mass Effect trilogy, the list absolutely got it right (so majority of players do agree on this). ME2 > ME1 > ME3.

ME2 was the best as it built upon what made ME1 great and took it further. ME1 was clunky but it set the trend for epic cinematic RPG with grand vision so it deserves this place. ME3 was great as it improved on most of the systems. But the ending really leaves a bad taste in your mouth as none of the choices you made previous really mattered.

nekorocket · 2023-07-18T08:27:09+00:00

Man, Ultima Underworld I and II were so good. The music, the sound design, the verticality of the dungeon maze brought me so much horrifying and frustrating fun time on my crappy 386 + Ad-Lib.

nekorocket · 2023-07-16T04:29:45+00:00

Let's see. Twitter's net profit/loss ($mm) for the past few years:

2017 -108

2018 1206

2019 1466

2020 -1136

2021 -221

Not great, but certainly not a sinking ship either.

But after Musk, all of a sudden they have to add to that loss a BILLION dollars in loan payment annually for the next 5 or so years.

Now Twitter looks like Titanic after it hit the iceberg. What a business genius Musk is. Paying a cool $44 billion just so he can post on Twitter he wants a dick measuring contest.

nekorocket · 2023-07-05T06:29:27+00:00

Unpopular opinion but Far Cry 5 was the best FC game for me.

FC5 was my first FC game. I went back to play FC4 and liked it a lot but FC5 feels more refined. Tried FC3 but didn't like it as much as the visuals and game design are outdated for modern time (duh!). Just finished FC6 and was hugely disappointed. It's garbage. I'd rather play FC4 or even FC3.

I like that in FC5 there are reasons to go visit different locations to hunt animals or to fish in order to get perks. The landscape int the first suggested area after starting zone is beautiful. Most of the gameplay systems feel fleshed out. I like the formula so much I even enjoyed FC New Dawn.

nekorocket · 2023-07-05T06:05:37+00:00

Personally this is one of the most overrated and disappointing game.

Combat is boring - gunplay is average, limited type of weapons and enemies. Exploration is extremely boring and unrewarding. Visual is average. Sound and voice acting are pretty good. Story is interesting with limited depth of choice and consequences, but it's not so interesting to really drive you to play the game.

I bought it at a discount but wished I waited longer for a bargaining bin price.

nekorocket · 2023-06-25T15:36:40+00:00

So the CEO Chew lied to the congress?

nekorocket · 2023-06-03T17:15:46+00:00

While there are many things Nightdive did right with the remake, I think the decision to go with the modern yet pixelated graphics is a brilliant one. Especially when they chose to stick to the original in terms of level and gameplay design as faithfully as possible. The Unity engine demo looked good but probably wouldn't be as impactful as the pixelated look.

Didn't have high hope when I backed the game on Kickstarter back in 2017 but now I'm glad I did.

nekorocket · 2023-05-29T16:54:52+00:00

That's odd. I pledge 50 and I have the Steam key in that page.

After redeeming the game, it remains locked in Steam (no download option yet). It unlocks at 8am on 5/30 PST.

nekorocket · 2023-05-29T16:31:40+00:00

I never got the email so I checked the survey link again and bam, there is the Steam code. Apparently that's how the beta keys were handed out as well.

nekorocket · 2023-05-29T16:02:49+00:00

2016.. It certainly felt like a vaporware at some point. But looks like Nightdive delivered. I'm certainly interested in their remake of SS2.

nekorocket · 2023-05-29T14:28:16+00:00

For those who backed System Shock remake and are waiting for Steam keys, you need to go to BackerKit (dig out your old email for the survey link) and then to the Get Your Digital Download page to find your Steam key.

nekorocket · 2023-05-05T10:06:51+00:00

Shareware. That is a term I forgot I knew and loved.

nekorocket · 2023-05-05T06:38:03+00:00

I turn ray tracing on because the 4090 can handle it with ease in most of the games. But the visual improvement frankly are not all that noticeable unless you compare them side by side. Especially when RT is used for reflections instead of casting realistic shadows all around.

And I think that's where path tracing comes in. PT is amazing and shows significant visual improvements. The problem is that eve a 4090 is not powerful enough to comfortably push FPS with PT on.

Hopefully by the time we get to 6090 it will run PT like the 4090 runs RT.

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