The only way around the dystopia this will lead to is to constantly and relentlessly shame and even harass all those involved in helping create it. The scolding in the issue tracker of that wretched "project" shall flow like a river, until the spirit of those pursuing it breaks, and the effort is disbanded.
And once the corporate hydra has regrown its head, repeat. Hopefully, enough practise makes those fighting the dystopia effective enough to one day topple over sponsoring and enabling organisations as a whole, instead of only their little initiatives leading down that path.
Not a pretty thing, but necessary.
AI is going to completely change search if it hasn't already, and google is not even close to compete in this space.
Video has some massive competition from the likes of TikTok. Anyway, YouTube isn't the only option on the market.
Gmail is still popular but since google has been pressuring users to pay, it's been easier than ever to find a reason to try another service.
Chromium can always be forked and have some parts removed or added, and as we all know quite a few browsers do this, some are quite popular.
Is google also losing IOS ads like Meta? If they do, that's another reason for alarm for them.
I'm not sure google is in the best position for the future and WEI is not going to be their golden ticket either.
And, if your prediction that web will change actually comes to pass, well then it'll be just another cycle for this space that has changed countless times since the age of dialup. The web is going to change, again and again, but as long as people are still free to set up a server and let the world access it, we can still do what we like with it.
The Halloween memos called this "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish". Google didn't just ignore the moves that provided M$ dominance.