The fact is though the average person is starting to replace their search engine with chatgpt, gemini, grok or whatever other llm and I have seen more and more small association using generative ai to make their posters instead of working with artist or soing it themselves.

Is this because LLMs are getting better, or because search engines are getting worse?

Because they are definitely getting worse. I get redirected to a brand new slopsite daily.

AI slop has just accelerated the downfall of search engines. Attention based economy, advertising and SEO are the reason you can’t find anything useful anymore. The Internet itself is broken and even if there was a good search engine it would struggle to not suffocate in the seo crap out there.

At this point, I am willing to pay a subscription for a search engine if it’s ad-free and shows me what I’m looking for.

Kagi, searxng, startpage, ddg if lazy…

Kagi is great but paid and some people have feeling about then using yandex.

There are so many solutions. People are lazy and keep using trash Google that doesnt even work. People ask me how in the world I find things. Because I am literate and I know how to use a computer. Its not hard guys.