Dead Internet theory

Academic literature often struggles to document online subcultures and conspiracy theories, making the origins of the dead Internet theory difficult to precisely identify. The first post on the dead Internet theory is thought to have originated on the image board Wizardchan. claiming to be building on previous posts from the same board and from Wizardchan, The conspiracy theory spread into online culture through widespread coverage on platforms such as YouTube, Reddit, and Twitter, where it was amplified by online communities and content creators. In 2023, the dead Internet theory entered academic literature when a book published by the CRC Press included a definition of the dead Internet theory in its glossary, and in 2024, when an opinion piece titled Artificial influencers and the dead internet theory was published in the Curmudgeon Corner of AI & Society. ==Claims==

. The dead Internet theory has two main components: that organic human activity on the web has been displaced by bots and algorithmically curated search results, and that state actors are doing this in a coordinated effort to manipulate the human population. The first part of the theory is described as the main argument, and the second where the conspiracy portion begins.) is keeping people connected to the internet to disguise this reality. In this discussion, Berghel points to the 2025 publication in AI & Society by Yoshija Walter, and lists algorithmic generated content, Generative AI byproducts, the difficulty for some people to distingusish between this and human generated content, and the resulting mistrust and misinformation as the core of the dead Internet theory. Berghel laments that conspiracy theorists take these phenomena and to make implausible claims, while arguing that core criticisms should not be dismissed. ==Expert view==

Caroline Busta, founder of the media platform New Models, was quoted in a 2021 article in The Atlantic calling much of the dead Internet theory a "paranoid fantasy", even if there are legitimate criticisms involving bot traffic and the integrity of the Internet, but she said she does agree with the "overarching idea". The article stated that even though bots do produce online content, the dead Internet theory is still not realistic. In a 2024 opinion column in AI & Societys "Curmudgeon Corner", Yoshija Walter stated that the once speculative theory is now observable with the introduction of AI generated content. Leikauf cites Walter's 2024 publication for his definition of the dead Internet theory. In a 2026 paper published in Computer (magazine), Hal Berghel discusses a "leaner" version of the theory, without the conspiratorial elements, focusing on the core claims. In this paper he states: == Criticism ==

The dead Internet theory has been cited by some as a conspiracy theory lacking credible evidence. While research has shown that automated bot accounts makeup a significant portion of internet traffic, experts emphasize that this provides no proof of a coordinated effort to replace human activity online. Researchers have also compared the dead Internet theory to other internet related conspiracy theories and note that these theories often stretch current trends, like artificial intelligence and increased bot activity, into speculative claims without using concrete evidence. ==Evidence==

Bot traffic In 2016, the security firm Imperva released a report on bot traffic after examining over 16.7 billion visits to 100,000 randomly selected domains, and found that automated programs were responsible for 52% of web traffic. This report has been used as evidence in reports on the dead Internet theory. The first of these to be well known was developed by OpenAI. These models have created significant controversy. For example, Timothy Shoup of the Copenhagen Institute for Futures Studies said in 2022, "in the scenario where GPT-3 'gets loose', the Internet would be completely unrecognizable". He predicted that in such a scenario, 99% to 99.9% of content online might be AI-generated by 2025 to 2030. In correspondence with Gizmodo, a Google spokesperson acknowledged the role of generative AI in the rapid proliferation of such content and that it could displace more valuable human-made alternatives. Bots using LLMs are anticipated to increase the amount of spam, and run the risk of creating a situation where bots interacting with each other create "self-replicating prompts" that result in loops only human users could disrupt. ChatGPT ChatGPT is an AI chatbot whose late 2022 release to the general public led journalists to call the dead Internet theory potentially more realistic than before. Before ChatGPT's release, the dead Internet theory mostly emphasized government organizations, corporations, and tech-literate individuals. Facebook In 2024, AI-generated images on Facebook, referred to as "AI slop", began going viral. Subjects of these AI-generated images included flight attendants, black children next to artwork they supposedly created, and various iterations of "Shrimp Jesus", depictions of Christ "meshed in various forms" with shrimp. Many of these posts had hundreds or even thousands of comments saying "Amen". The images were cited as an example of the Internet of the time having begun to feel "dead". Sommerer discussed Shrimp Jesus in detail within his article as a symbol to represent the shift in the Internet, specifically stating: Facebook includes an option to provide AI-generated responses to group posts. Such responses appear if a user explicitly tags @MetaAI in a post, or if the post includes a question and no other users have responded to it within an hour. In January 2025, interest renewed in the theory following statements from Meta on their plans to introduce new AI-powered autonomous accounts. Connor Hayes, vice-president of product for generative AI at Meta stated, "We expect these AIs to actually, over time, exist on our platforms, kind of in the same way that accounts do ... They'll have bios and profile pictures and be able to generate and share content powered by AI on the platform." These accounts were quickly removed. Reddit In the past, the Reddit website allowed free access to its API and data, which allowed users to employ third-party moderation apps and train AI in human interaction. In 2023, the company moved to charge for access to its user dataset. Companies training AI are expected to continue to use this data for training future AI. As LLMs such as ChatGPT become available to the general public, they are increasingly being employed on Reddit by users and bot accounts. and fake views were so prevalent that some engineers were concerned YouTube's algorithm for detecting them would begin to treat the fake views as default and start misclassifying real ones. Digg On June 23, 2025, Alexis Ohanian, one of the Reddit co-founders, said he thought he "long subscribed to the dead Internet theory" ever since AI has started being able to pass the Turing test, and on October 29, 2025 at TechCrunch Disrupt, Alexis reportedly told Kevin Rose, one of the original founders of Digg (a social media website originally created in 2004), "the dead internet theory is real", whilst Kevin said that he wanted to use zero-knowledge proofs to make a platform full of trusted users. On January 14, 2026, Digg was relaunched in open beta by Alexis Ohanian and Kevin Rose, but was closed 2 months later on March 14 due to an "unprecedented bot problem" among other issues. ==In popular culture==

The dead Internet theory has been discussed among users of the social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter). Users have noted that bot activity has affected their experience. Numerous YouTube channels and online communities, including the Linus Tech Tips forums and the Joe Rogan subreddit, have covered the dead Internet theory, bringing the idea into mainstream discourse. == See also ==