Jake Ward (@jakezward)

Reddit is disappearing from ChatGPT citations right now, but I honestly think everyone is focusing on the wrong part of the story: Reddit isn't what matters most here. Because something much bigger seems to have changed in how ChatGPT searches. 8 August: ChatGPT started citing Reddit less. 14 August: Basically stopped citing Reddit at all. But at almost exactly the same time, ChatGPT’s query fan-outs started changing too. It began using way more specific searches like: > site:ibm .com > ibm official pricing > ibm docs [feature] Which suggests ChatGPT is doing less: search the web > see what ranks > cite it And more: choose where to search > search those sites or brands > build the answer But Reddit isn't the only thing changing, another dataset found that it’s the entire citation mix: > Reddit: 15% → 0% > review sites/forums: 7% → 0% > smaller company sites: 66% → 32% While: > help centres/docs: 2% → 32% > established companies: 4% → 18% > app marketplaces: 2% → 17% This is the part I find most interesting. Is ChatGPT starting to decide which sources it trusts before it searches? Does that make the authority of the source more important than where an individual page ranks? And how long does any of this last? Because if AI search keeps proving one thing, it’s how quickly things change. Reddit looked incredibly important 2 weeks ago. In another 2 weeks, this could all look different again.