The emergence of agentic AI systems and new payment protocols could radically transform the economics of the internet, threatening traditional online advertising models and paving the way for direct micropayments between agents and services.
Sam Ragsdale, CEO and Founder of Merit Systems, a company developing infrastructure for evaluating rewards for users and AI agents in the digital environment, explained how autonomous AI agents could fundamentally reshape the internet’s economic model.
Ragsdale argues that the development of so-called Open Agentic Commerce, an open model that eliminates intermediaries and closed ecosystems in favor of open protocols, could jeopardize the online advertising market, currently valued at $291 billion.
According to him, the traditional internet monetization model based on advertising is becoming less effective as large language models (LLM) and agentic systems spread. He notes that from 1997 to 2024, the internet economy was built on the “monetization of attention,” but AI agents don’t interact with ads and generate no value for them.
Ragsdale emphasizes that while users browsing web pages may be distracted by ads, agents performing tasks ignore such elements entirely. This fundamentally undermines the existing model, where attracting and retaining attention is key.
He identifies the first stage of transformation as the integration of purchasing functions within AI platforms. For example, ChatGPT introduced the Instant Checkout tool, allowing users to make purchases without visiting external websites. Such solutions are expected to reach hundreds of millions of users, increase conversion rates for sellers, and enable platforms to earn commissions in the range of 5–10%.
However, these solutions remain closed ecosystems where seller access is restricted by strict selection procedures. In the long term, Ragsdale believes they will be replaced by open protocols that allow AI agents to independently discover products and services and interact with them directly.
Ragsdale believes that online advertising models, which previously fueled the growth of the open internet, are beginning to lose relevance by 2026. They’re being replaced by Open Agentic Commerce, where economic relationships are formed directly between participants without the involvement of advertising platforms.
Solutions for enabling micropayments and settlements between AI agents and services without intermediaries are rapidly developing. Coinbase launched crypto wallet infrastructure for AI agents based on the specialized x402 protocol. deBridge introduced an MCP server that allows AI agents to perform cross-chain operations without relinquishing control over funds. Meanwhile, Visa presented a tool for AI agent payments and expanded the capabilities of Tempo’s Machine Payments Protocol (MPP) within card-based payments.
