You can’t ignore Google Zero anymore
On The Vergecast: Google vs. websites, OpenAI vs. Hugging Face, and Ford’s deal with Apple Maps.
On The Vergecast: Google vs. websites, OpenAI vs. Hugging Face, and Ford’s deal with Apple Maps.
by David Pierce
Jul 24, 2026, 5:29 PM UTC
David Pierce
is editor-at-large and Vergecast co-host with over a decade of experience covering consumer tech. Previously, at Protocol, The Wall Street Journal, and Wired.
The web and Google once had a deal: Google collects data and indexes webpages and in exchange sends oceans of traffic to websites. The deal wasn’t perfect and certainly made Google more money than it made the websites, but it worked for a long time. Now, however, the deal seems to be dead. And the web is being forced to reckon with what happens when the Google traffic dries up.
On this episode of The Vergecast, David and Nilay talk about the week’s Google Zero news, including Reddit’s interest in getting out of an AI training deal, and the publishers considering blocking Google from crawling their sites altogether. (Nilay also takes a bit of a victory lap on the whole “Google Zero” term, but only a short one.) Even Google’s Search business is feeling the AI crunch, and it’s anyone’s guess what happens next.
After that, it’s time for some AI news, including questions on how much to panic about OpenAI accidentally hacking Hugging Face, and the many dubious AI detector systems coming to platforms near you. We also have a Hype Desk, an episode of Brendan Carr is a Dummy, some news on an Apple payment plan, a new minimalist phone, and a special guest appearance to talk about Ford and Apple Maps.
In case you missed it this week: We also talked about the state of the US / China AI race, the rise of the EV golf cart, all of Samsung’s new foldables, and the end of reading. And we want to hear all your thoughts about all of it! Call the Vergecast Hotline at 866-VERGE11, send us an email at vergecast@theverge.com, and tell us everything that’s on your mind. And make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss an episode!
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- David Pierce
The Verge Daily
A free daily digest of the news that matters most.
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