The “dead internet” theory gets thrown around a lot these days especially by people critical of AI. The worry is that large language models and bots will flood the web with so much synthetic content that real human interaction will disappear - that everything will become artificial, empty, and repetitive.

But I’d argue we’re already well into that phase - and it didn’t take AI to get us here.

Originality is rare. Most content is recycled, reposted, reformatted like an endless stream of re-runs. Even the way people respond has become increibly predictable. You can write something mildly controversial or just unfamiliar, and you already know what you’re going to get: knee-jerk downvotes, the same tired comebacks, some vague accusation about your motives or identity - not a genuine engagement with the point. People don’t seem to read anymore so much as scan for whether you’re “one of them” or not.

And that’s the thing. Most users aren’t engaging with ideas - they’re running scripts. They’ve absorbed certain patterns from years online and now just execute them reflexively: a snarky quote from a meme here, a one-liner they saw get upvotes last week there. It’s social media call-and-response. And it’s killing the internet way more effectively than any AI could.

And yes, I already know how some people will respond to this - with some version of “I’ve never had those issues, maybe you’re the problem.” But never facing pushback isn’t a flex when you’ve been conditioned to avoid it. It’s like priding yourself on never failing when in reality you’ve never even taken a risk. Of course it feels like everything is fine if you’ve learned how to blend in. You’ve trained yourself not to touch the wire. That doesn’t disprove the problem. It is the problem.