The internet is all bots now | The Gray Area
Sean talks with Atlantic writer Charlie Warzel about the increasingly weird experience of being online. They discuss AI-generated content, bots, algorithms, the “dead internet theory,” and why so much of the web now feels artificial, manipulated, or unreal. They also explore psyops, conspiracy culture, social media, and the deeper question lurking beneath the AI boom: What are human beings actually for?
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Host: Sean Illing (@seanilling)
Guest: Charlie Warzel (@cwarzel)
00:00 Intro
01:45 The bot-haunted internet
08:53 Why the internet feels fake
15:11 The post-human internet
22:37 What is a psyop?
29:22 What is AI slop?
37:57 Charlie Warzel’s favorite part of the internet
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@Joe-momma2268
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Vox is a bot.
@stephengarfield4691
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
You guys are real people but you are just talking heads on a screen to me.
@autingo6583
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
just call anything you don't like "bot activity." it's also a well-loved tactic for dehumanizing real people you disagree with. that way, you don't have to do the work of engaging with their arguments.
@Oneoftheseday
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
i wish anyone using suno to have erectile dysfunction
@leaderofapes
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
why is it bad to listen to music ai makes that you like the rhythm instruments vocals and maybe even lyrics. do we have to hate it because someone is not making money making other music you might like that you are not aware of, it would not be the same song so if you discover it you would listen to that too. ai music and images are great. there is bad stuff there but so do many people make terrible music and images. should the those people be put out of business because they don't have any talent.
@gaabackerman
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
19:33 about 20 minutes in…
@casbot71
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
In retrospect i should have chosen a different username all those years ago.
@ScootinUrCoot1738
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Lol maybe thats what YALL are doing but for the rest of us creators who dont fall into those categories…it'd be nice to hear about those stories
@VickyGirlyy
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Anyone who had experienced the internet in the late 90s and early 2000s understands just how bad the internet is now. We had it made!
@willemvanriet7160
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Hunan attention is the only gold. Bots are just creating a dead space…
@Miguel_Noether
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
In the meantime enjoy the ride, build a portfolio of infrastructure of ai and take advantage of the situation if you're not actively planning to change this situation…
@SquidXerox
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
38:54 -This is the most autistic coded thing ever. And I absolutely love it.
@U.B.U.-I.M.E
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
This excellent interview is the best explanation of the enshittification of the Internet.
@PKThorin
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
"Interslop"
@rsaunders57
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Wow, the ads that YouTube chose to go with this video are reinforcing the video's message at every turn, except for your embedded AG1/Quince/Hims plugs – of course. While I deeply hope this is someone at YouTube with a strong sense of irony interfering with the ad algorithm to show ads that make YouTube seem more bot-haunted, we all know that's not what's happening. Every ad is synthetic content or AI-slop or "make your slop more quickly with our tool".
I don't think this is as new as TGA portrays it. It started with Search Engine Optimization back in the 1990s. Then Google formalized it with PageRank in 2001, and revised it with Panda and Penguin in the 2010s. Marketing to the bots, at least the Google web crawler bot, has been the case for decades.
If you watch your YouTube feed, then you're choosing the bot-run Internet. Use "Subscriptions" while it's still around! Thanks for introducing me to Charlie.
@StudioHoekhuis
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
… sponsored by AG1? Really?
@IHMadeThis
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
"…but am I profiting more…?" – capitalist
@h7opolo
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
well, we know which arm he took the covid shot in, "right???"
@BuiNhatAnh-e4j
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Just caught a glimpse of this and couldn't look away. It's so true and honestly mind-blowing! Watching the rest right now. 👌🔥
@jsalsman
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
One rarely discussed silver lining is that the median AI astroturfing campaign is so incompetently run that most people are being inoculated against even the sophisticated campaigns.
@catz12ten
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
“What is a human for” — questioning our inherent humanity is more than just something we can say is lost— it was taken from us. AI is a symptom of our “race to the bottom” capitalism-based economy that reduces us to our output and capacity to consume. The system was never meant to serve us, and its sustainability is nonexistent. We are slowly coming to realize as a society that what we value (humanity), cannot be entrusted to cooperations (or their technologies) to ever just “do the right thing.” Peaceful movements rarely have sparked real change, and I think the collective dis-ease and anger citizens of the internet are experiencing is an extension of that we experience irl. Online spaces are particularly vulnerable to capitalism’s enshitification but we’re fed up with it in all of its forms. I’m hopeful society will organize and larger shifts towards humanity are not only possible, but well underway.
@newinhuman
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
imagine how politicians feel, they litterally can't use the internet lol its all bots and spam manipulated by idf etc etc
@Shirley-v9s
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Title A/B test spotted on this video
YouTube's quietly testing a few titles here. At the moment it's about:
• “The internet is all bots now | The Gray Area” — about 50% of viewers
• “The bot-haunted internet | The Gray Area” — about 30% of viewers
• “The end of the human internet | The Gray Area” — about 20% of viewers ……
@ahmedcargoahmeecargo2682
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Please remember the 20,000 children and infants killed in Gaza by American weapons at the hands of the Israeli army, and the tens of thousands of Palestinian children whose hands and feet were amputated. Most of the children's surgeries were performed without even anesthesia due to shortages.
@owenloh9300
June 26, 2026 at 11:59 pm
Title A/B test spotted on this video
YouTube's quietly testing a few titles here. At the moment it's about:
• “The internet is all bots now | The Gray Area” — about 50% of viewers
• “The bot-haunted internet | The Gray Area” — about 30% of viewers
• “The end of the human internet | The Gray Area” — about 20% of viewers
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