SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – Lou Paskalis has a characteristically blunt assessment of artificial intelligence’s growing appetite for content, likening it less to innovation and more to a well-organized heist.
“The reason that I think the IAB is correctly calling AI scraping an existential threat to publishers is because it is routinized theft,” the advertising veteran said in this interview at the Beet Retreat San Juan, before clarifying that platforms are “literally stealing original IP, blending it in their platform and presenting it as an answer.”
If that sounds dramatic, Paskalis insists the stakes justify the tone. Without fair compensation, he argued, the entire information ecosystem risks collapse.
“If all of the original content publishers are not able to get fair value… then the forest dies, there’s no more fuel for the AI scrapers,” he said to Beet.TV contributor David Kaplan.
In other words, if the internet becomes one big recycling machine, eventually there is nothing left to recycle except your cousin’s Facebook posts.
Open web’s midlife crisis
Paskalis, a longtime champion of the open web, framed the current moment as a familiar crisis wearing a new hoodie. He compared AI scraping to earlier battles in music and media, where creators fought to be paid for their work.
“We know that this issue will be addressed,” he said, though he added a catch: “the problem is we’re running out of time for ad-supported publishers.”
Complicating matters is a shifting audience. People want free content but fewer ads, and subscription fatigue is real. That leaves publishers trying to fund journalism while audiences dodge paywalls and pre-rolls with Olympic precision.
At its core, Paskalis said, the industry still depends on a simple trade: attention in exchange for access.
“That dynamic must hold,” he said.
Patchwork future for content economics
If anyone was hoping for a clean, elegant solution, Paskalis had bad news. The future looks messy.
“There’s no silver bullet to how creators can actually make a sustainable income,” he said, pointing to a hybrid model that blends subscriptions, ads and licensing.
He noted that while some publishers have struck licensing deals with tech platforms, most have not, raising an uncomfortable question about who gets paid and who gets left behind.
“The New York Times famously did a deal… but what about the other 99.99%?” he asked.
His conclusion: experimentation is necessary, but urgency is non-negotiable.
Law, order and a reminder from Congress
On whether AI companies should pay for content, Paskalis didn’t hedge.
“The answer… was written long ago. And that answer is legally, they must pay for that content,” he said.
He warned against tossing out intellectual property laws in the rush to build the next big thing, arguing that enforcement, not reinvention, is what is needed.
There was also a gentle jab at policymakers’ tech literacy, recalling a famous congressional moment when Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg testified: “Senator, we run ads.”
The implication was clear. If lawmakers struggled to understand social media, AI may require an even steeper learning curve.
Local news, global stakes
While much of the debate centers on national publishers, Paskalis made a case for local journalism as both vital and vulnerable.
“All high-quality content producers, whether national or local, will benefit from something,” he said, adding that local news remains “the most trusted… and the most vital form of news.”
From school board meetings to weather updates, local outlets provide the kind of information no algorithm can fully replace, assuming they survive long enough to keep producing it.
Advertisers follow the ‘easy button’
For marketers, the rise of AI platforms presents both temptation and risk. Paskalis admitted he recently leaned heavily on one himself.
“I spent the weekend with Perplexity, and it was amazing,” he said, describing how it synthesized research that went straight into client work.
That convenience, he noted, mirrors the broader shift toward “easy button” platforms, from walled gardens to automated systems. But convenience has consequences.
Eventually, he argued, these platforms will need sustainable revenue models, and that likely means advertising.
“Never is a very long time in our industry,” he quipped, referencing past vows from companies that later embraced ads.
Quality over quantity, finally
Looking ahead, Paskalis predicts a consolidation of advertiser focus.
“Advertisers will do significantly more business with significantly fewer outlets that really represent their values,” he said.
That shift could favor premium environments where ads align closely with content, rather than interrupt it. In that world, marketers stop obsessing over cheap impressions and start chasing meaningful engagement.
“CPM is a race to the bottom. Customer engagement is a race to the top,” he said.
It is a neat line, and a hopeful one. But like much of Paskalis’ outlook, it comes with a caveat.
The system can work, but only if the people who create the content get paid before the robots finish summarizing it.
You’re watching coverage from Beet Retreat San Juan 2026, presented by Alliant and TransUnion. For more videos from this series, please visit this page.
