The publisher of Rolling Stone has taken an unprecedented step by suing Google. This marks the first instance of a major US publisher pursuing legal action against the tech company over AI-created summaries. Penske Media Corporation, which runs Rolling Stone and draws in about 120 million visitors online each month. Argues against Google’s use of AI Overviews at the top of search result pages. This might shape the future of digital publishing.
A federal court filing in Washington DC. States that 20% of Google searches linking to Penske Media sites now include AI-made summaries. This number is expected to grow over time. The Rolling Stone publisher and others has also seen its affiliate revenue drop losing more than one-third of its peak value by late 2024 as search traffic declines further. The lawsuit says Google uses its near-total control of the US search market. Close to 90%—to pressure publishers into letting their content show up in AI summaries. If they refuse, their visibility in search results could be at risk.
Penske Media sues Google over AI content use
On September 12, 2025, Penske Media Corporation brought a lawsuit against Google in a Washington, DC federal court. Led by Jay Penske, the family-run media giant claims that Google’s AI Overviews use its journalism without permission while also cutting down traffic to its platforms.
The complaint outlines a serious accusation. It says Google puts publishers in a no-win situation. They can either let Google use their work in AI summaries or risk being left out of search results . If that pressure did not exist, Google would have to pay for republishing rights or to train its AI using publisher content.
Jay Penske said, “We must take action to protect the future of digital media and keep it honest, which Google’s behavior is putting at risk,” while talking about the lawsuit.
Google has rejected the accusations. Jose Castaneda, a spokesperson for the company, said, “AI Overviews improve Search to make it more useful and open up new ways for content to be found. We plan to fight these baseless accusations.”
The lawsuit brings attention to the disagreements publishers and tech giants face regarding content rights. Danielle Coffey, who leads the News/Media Alliance representing over 2,200 publishers in the US, pointed out the uneven playing field. She stated, “When Google operates with its massive scale and market power, it is not required to follow the same norms. That creates the issue.”
AI-driven summaries lower traffic and earnings for publishers
Penske Media’s lawsuit against Google highlights how its AI Overviews hurt publisher traffic. Research shows people click on regular search results 8% of the time when AI summaries appear down from 15% when there are none. Users click links within the summaries themselves, with such clicks happening in just 1% of visits.
The impact goes beyond fewer visitors. Publishers have seen click-through rates drop from 5.1% to just 0.6% on content that performed well. Even when sites maintain top ranks in organic search, their traffic has decreased by 25% despite getting more visibility in search results.
These drops lead straight to lost earnings. Penske Media confirms that affiliate link revenue has fallen by over a third since late 2024. Smaller publishers feel the sting even more. One site’s ad earnings have crashed from $7,000-$10,000 a month to $1,500 now.
Because of this, some publications are struggling to survive. The entertainment news outlet Giant Freakin Robot shut its doors after sharp traffic drops linked to AI Overviews’ release. Travel blog The Planet D followed suit after losing 90% of its traffic.
Even though publishers have raised concerns, Google insists it “prioritizes sending traffic to the web” and still “sends billions of clicks to websites every day.” But with AI Overviews now showing up in half of search results, publishers are dealing with challenges they have never faced before.
Google backs AI Overviews as backlash grows
After Penske Media filed a lawsuit, Google denied accusations that AI Overviews hurt publishers. Jose Castaneda, a Google spokesperson, claimed these tools “make Search more helpful and create new opportunities for content to be discovered.” He said the company plans to oppose the “meritless claims” in the legal case.
Google claims that “total organic click volume from Google Search to websites has stayed pretty steady year-over-year.” The company also says it is now sending “more quality clicks to websites than a year ago.” It describes quality clicks as ones where people don’t bounce back to the search results right away.
Liz Reid, who leads Google Search, challenges independent studies that claim traffic has dropped. She says these studies are “often based on flawed methodologies isolated examples, or traffic changes that happened before AI features were added to Search.” Google insists that “AI Overviews are driving more queries and quality clicks.”
The company makes it clear that their AI Overviews result in “people seeing more links on the page than before.” According to Google, users are now asking “longer more complex questions,” which used to take several searches to answer.
Google keeps repeating its stance in this debate. It claims to send “billions of clicks to websites each day” and says its AI tools “enable people to ask even more questions.”
Conclusion
The conflict between Penske Media and Google marks a key moment to shape the future of publishing. The final outcome will set critical rules about how AI content and publisher rights work together in the online world. While Google insists its AI Overviews improve user experience and boost meaningful clicks, publishers seem to feel they’re facing a much harsher situation.
Traffic dropping by as much as 90 percent on some sites and click-through rates falling from 5.1 percent to 0.6 percent reveal tough times ahead for content creators. These trends raise big questions about how the industry can survive when tech companies take value from original journalism but don’t pay for it.
A major issue in this fight is the unequal balance of power. Google’s stronghold over the market pushes publishers into a corner. They must either let their content be used in AI-generated summaries or risk being buried in search results. Even so, publishers like Penske Media are pushing back against these terms instead of accepting them.
The lawsuit sheds light on deeper struggles between technology platforms and traditional media that go far beyond this one case. We are likely at the start of many legal conflicts as publishers work to defend their business models against disruptions caused by artificial intelligence.
, courts will need to decide if Google’s actions fall under fair use or count as copyright violations. That ruling will play a big role in shaping how content creators and tech companies interact going forward. At its core, this case also makes people think harder about the role of original journalism today when AI tools can summarize content and might make visiting publishers’ websites unnecessary.