The recent Perplexity acquisition rumors echo the moment Google was getting ready to buy YouTube back in 2006.

Back then, pundits were concerned Google was taking on a whole host of potential copyright-infringement lawsuits as YouTube was chock full of pirated videos. YouTube has since built a sophisticated copyright detection algorithm that does a pretty good job of detecting not only pirated videos but also when copyrighted music is used as a video soundtrack.

In hindsight, the then ineffable purchase price of $1.65 Billion was a bargain. YouTube’s technology was transformational. As YouTube expanded, it was no longer necessary to download a QuickTime plugin or other special player software. Once YouTube’s javascript libraries became ubiquitous, online video was solved for good. YouTube TV launched in 2017 to disrupt an entrenched cable television industry and now generates more total viewing time than both cable and broadcast television, combined.

Could the same be said for the potential acquisition of Perplexity? While all LLMs share an index made up of the common crawl and anything else they can find on the open internet, will Perplexity’s vectorized index of exclusively licensed news sources drive enough usage and value to a potential acquirer?

While YouTube’s pre-acquisition copyright concerns ended up being nothing more than a speed bump, it eventually started a formalized conversation around formally licensing content. Could Perplexity’s fledging licensing program be the start of a more sustainable way grow the new AI ecosystem?