People Inc. is not blocking Google's AI crawlers, chief executive Neil Vogel told Digiday in an article published on 4 August 2026, even though the publisher's traffic from Google search is down 40% year over year. His reason is mechanical rather than philosophical: Google's AI crawling cannot currently be separated from its search crawling, so, in his words, "If we were to turn off AI, we would turn off search".
Every figure below comes from People Inc.'s own Q2 2026 reporting, relayed by Digiday reporter Sara Guaglione. People Inc. is a US publisher with an interest in showing its revenue diversification is working, so the numbers are self-reported, not independently audited.
The traffic figures People Inc. reported
People Inc. told Digiday, in the piece published 4 August 2026, that Google search now accounts for 21% of its traffic, down from 25% in the previous quarter. Core sessions fell 22% year over year, and traffic from Google search specifically fell 40% year over year.
Digiday attributes that search decline to the AI-search environment. The article does not isolate how much of it comes from AI Overviews as against Google algorithm changes or category effects in People Inc.'s own content mix, so that split is not established by the source. This is also one company's data: a 40% decline at one large US publisher is not a market-wide rate.
Why the publisher will not block the crawler
Vogel's argument, as reported by Digiday on 4 August 2026, is that there is no separate switch. Google's AI crawling and its search crawling are the same access, so a publisher that blocks the first also leaves the second. That makes the robots.txt decision a decision about being in Google Search at all, which at People Inc.'s size is not a live option.
On where the company sits now, Vogel's position is paraphrased here rather than quoted, because the exact wording could not be confirmed: he indicated People Inc. sees itself as close to the point where search stops being a material driver of its value, but not there yet.
The response is revenue mix, not crawler policy
People Inc. reported that non-session-based revenue, which it counts as social, native campaigns, events, sponsorships, email, its D/Cipher tool and licensing, grew 16% year over year in Q2 2026. It rose from $108 million to $125 million between Q2 2025 and Q2 2026, moving from 39% to 43% of total digital revenue. Session-based revenue, the part that needs people to arrive on pages, fell from 61% to 57% over the same period.
Chief financial officer Tim Quinn said ad rates rose significantly in the quarter. The source does not attach a percentage to that increase, so it is reported here as direction only.
The numbers side by side
The table sets each reported figure against its period. Every row is self-reported by People Inc. and relayed by Digiday.
| Metric | Earlier period | Later period |
|---|---|---|
| Non-session revenue, share of digital revenue | 39% in Q2 2025 | 43% in Q2 2026 |
| Non-session revenue, dollars | $108 million in Q2 2025 | $125 million in Q2 2026 |
| Session-based revenue, share of digital revenue | 61% in Q2 2025 | 57% in Q2 2026 |
| Google search, share of all traffic | 25% in the previous quarter | 21% in the latest quarter |
| Core sessions | Q2 2025 base | Down 22% year over year |
| Google search traffic | Q2 2025 base | Down 40% year over year |
What this means for Thai marketers
Digiday's article says nothing about Thailand or Thai publishers, so what follows is reasoning rather than reporting. The transferable part is structural. If blocking Google's AI crawler currently means leaving Google Search, then for a Thai content-led business the lever available today is revenue mix, not robots.txt. People Inc.'s numbers describe a company shifting weight onto revenue that does not depend on a search session, and that shift took quarters, not weeks.
For Thai teams that means treating search-dependent revenue as a measured share rather than an assumption: know what percentage of revenue needs an organic session, and watch it the way People Inc. watches its 57%. It also means that visibility inside AI answers and ordinary ranking are crawled through the same door, so the work is being citable and being present, not choosing between them. Formats that survive a summarised answer, such as owned email lists and direct client relationships, carry more weight than they did when a ranking guaranteed a visit. That is an argument for auditing where content actually earns its return, and for keeping organic search fundamentals intact while the mix moves.
Frequently asked questions
Did AI Overviews cause People Inc.'s 40% search decline?
The source does not establish that. Digiday attributes the decline to the AI-search environment but does not isolate AI Overviews from Google algorithm changes or category effects, so the share attributable to AI Overviews specifically is unknown from this reporting.
Can a publisher block Google's AI crawler and stay in Google Search?
According to Vogel, not currently. His stated reason for keeping the crawlers on is that turning off Google's AI access would also turn off search access, which is why People Inc. has not done it.
Does People Inc. block AI crawlers from other companies?
The source does not state it. Digiday's article covers the position on Google's crawlers only, and does not say what People Inc. does with crawlers run by other AI companies.
Does a 40% decline mean Thai sites should expect the same?
No. This is one US publisher's self-reported figure for its own portfolio, and the article contains no Thai or regional data. Treating it as a benchmark for a Thai site reads a single company's result as a market rate, which the reporting does not support.
Do we have to change anything on our site because of this?
Nothing in the story requires a technical change. It reports one publisher's decision and its quarterly numbers. The action it points at is measuring how much of your revenue depends on an organic session arriving, which is a reporting exercise rather than a site change.
The short version
A large US publisher put numbers to what its search traffic is doing, said blocking Google's AI crawler is not separable from being in Google Search, and pointed at revenue mix as the response. Those numbers are its own and unaudited, the cause of the decline is not broken out, and one company is not a market. As reported by Digiday in Sara Guaglione's 4 August 2026 article, it is still one of the few named datasets on this question. Knowing what share of your revenue depends on a search click is where to start.
