AI has meant a huge increase in Web traffic hitting the Media History Digital Library: largely in the form of scrapers/crawlers, but also as "agents" in new cha
The Media History Digital Library is experiencing a significant surge in web traffic, primarily from AI-driven scrapers and agents. This increased activity, while potentially useful for AI applications, has overwhelmed the library's systems, leading to a denial-of-service effect that has disrupted many of its projects. Eric Hoyt detailed these impacts, highlighting the challenges posed by AI's demand for web data. AI
IMPACT AI's demand for web data is straining digital archives, potentially disrupting access to historical information.