How one founder’s bet on ‘the old school web’ is paying off

This article from The Verge focuses on the choice made by founder Craig Campbell: at a time when investor money is flowing massively toward AI, instead of joining the generative AI startup frenzy, he went the other way and built a website. The article opens by emphasizing that Campbell is not incapable of building an AI company; he was once a Meta engineer, has technical startup experience, and sold his previous venture in 2022, a product serving businesses that use e-commerce tools. So his choice to step away from the river of AI funding and invest in the "old school web" is used by The Verge to contrast with the current industry mood: nearly every startup narrative has had its attention pulled away by AI, models, and automation, yet websites, content, and the open web itself may still hold value. From the content provided, the article is not introducing a new AI model or tool, nor is it a technical tutorial; rather, it uses the founder's decision as a piece of business observation. For Taiwanese readers, the key point is this: when AI becomes the default answer for fundraising and media attention, entrepreneurs need not only chase models or AI apps; finding a clear need and building a web product that users can directly visit and understand may still be a viable path. The phrase "old school web" in the title also hints that traditional websites, search traffic, content discovery, and active user browsing are having their business significance re-examined against the backdrop of Google Zero and AI summaries changing how traffic is distributed.