I think there’s actually two dimensions to this problem and the article and your comment only address one of them.
The other dimension is that, in the past, if you searched for stuff your results were likely to be a blog or a forum thread. Today the bloggers have evolved into instagrammers, TikTokkers, YouTubers, or Podcasters. The Forums and community pages have moved to Facebook, Twitter, Slack, Discord, etc.
So it’s not just that SEO and botspam has eaten the Google results page, it’s that this is all that’s left of the open internet that needed search to navigate. Much of it truly is a wasteland. Google owns part of the blame for crippling RSS and privileging recent pages and specific domains or AMP pages over evergreen, self-hosted content in search results. But also users have given up on the open internet in droves. Instead of starting a fansite they start fan subreddits or discords instead.
The other dimension is that, in the past, if you searched for stuff your results were likely to be a blog or a forum thread. Today the bloggers have evolved into instagrammers, TikTokkers, YouTubers, or Podcasters. The Forums and community pages have moved to Facebook, Twitter, Slack, Discord, etc.
So it’s not just that SEO and botspam has eaten the Google results page, it’s that this is all that’s left of the open internet that needed search to navigate. Much of it truly is a wasteland. Google owns part of the blame for crippling RSS and privileging recent pages and specific domains or AMP pages over evergreen, self-hosted content in search results. But also users have given up on the open internet in droves. Instead of starting a fansite they start fan subreddits or discords instead.