Have never understood this.

A paid search API seems like it would be easy money for Google. And maybe some lock-in for all sorts of start-ups and enterprises.

There are so many apps that would benefit from search.

I get that it means they can't serve ads.

But you've got to be willing to disrupt yourself or you'll lose eventually anyway.

Better to figure out how to make money from ads and an API, than to cower in fear.

That same fear may be why they failed to be first movers in LLMs.

Have to be willing to disrupt yourself.

At the same time, I've never built a billion dollar company. So I'm absolutely armchair quarterbacking here.