Impact isn't always immediate or easily quantified. It can surface quietly in an email from a listener, a shift in public understanding, or a decision made differently because someone finally has the information they need. In a nonprofit newsroom, those moments matter as much as any headline. Over the past year, NPR's reporting has met audiences where they are, reflecting the realities they're living every day.
Visits to major US news websites have plummeted since Google rolled out its artificial intelligence search feature last year, with some plunging 40%, according to troubling new data. Of the top 50 news domains, 37 suffered year-over-year traffic declines after the launch of Google's AI Overviews last May, according to SimilarWeb. The drastic dropoff comes despite headline-grabbing events that included the assassination attempt on Donald Trump last summer and his stunning election victory over Kamala Harris a few months later.