“AI Will Break the Internet” — Cloudflare CEO’s Big Prediction
What if your company’s mission turned out to be bigger than you imagined?
In this episode of The Eric Ries Show, I speak with Matthew Prince, co-founder and CEO of Cloudflare, now a $70 billion company defending 20% of all internet traffic. We trace how Cloudflare’s mission wasn’t declared at the start, but discovered through a series of principled decisions, from protecting journalists and activists to making encryption free for everyone.
We also explore today’s urgent challenges: how AI’s shift from search engines to answer engines threatens the web’s business model, why creators must be compensated, and what a sustainable, human-centered internet could look like.
This is a conversation about technology, power, and what it means to build with principle.
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Where to find Mathew Prince:
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mprince/
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Where to find Eric:
• Newsletter:https://ericries.carrd.co/
• Podcast:https://ericriesshow.com/
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In This Episode We Cover:
(00:00) Intro
(02:44) Cloudflare’s history of blogging
(08:06) How Cloudflare got involved in safeguarding democracy
(14:30) How Matthew learned Cloudflare would make enemies
(16:42) Why Cloudflare stopped charging for encryption
(18:36) How a series of principled decisions led to Cloudflare’s mission
(26:24) Why a clear mission makes recruiting and building a company easier
(32:00) Cloudflare’s culture of psychological safety around failure
(34:18) Lessons from Cloudflare’s mission and scrappy early team
(44:27) Why scale and valuation didn’t shake Cloudflare’s mission
(50:12) How the shift from search to answers is reshaping the internet
(1:01:00) Why we need a new business model to compensate content makers
(1:03:48) Matthew’s vision for a sustainable future of creators and AI
(1:06:26) How supporting creators sustains both the internet and Cloudflare’s mission
(1:09:57) Lessons from Spotify on supporting creators
(1:12:26) How Cloudflare handles its civic responsibility with transparency
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Referenced:
- Cloudflare: https://www.cloudflare.com/
- The Cloudflare blog: https://blog.cloudflare.com/
- Largest DDoS attack hit PopVote, Hong Kong Democracy voting site: https://www.cyberdefensemagazine.com/largest-ddos-attack-hit-popvote/
- Cloudflare named in 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Security Service Edge: https://blog.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-sse-gartner-magic-quadrant-2025/
- Cloudflare: The Invisible Shield Protecting 20% of the Web: https://technologymagazine.com/articles/cloudflare-the-invisible-shield-protecting-20-of-the-web
- Why Google Went Offline Today and a Bit about How the Internet Works: https://blog.cloudflare.com/why-google-went-offline-today-and-a-bit-about/
- Project Galileo: https://www.cloudflare.com/galileo/
- Mozilla: https://www.mozilla.org
- Ray Rathrock on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ray-rothrock-75b9403/
- Michelle Zatlyn on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michellezatlyn/
- The Steve Ballmer Interview: https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/the-steve-ballmer-interview
- Don’t be evil: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_be_evil
- Clayton Christensen: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clayton_Christensen
- The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book That Will Change the Way You Do Business: https://www.amazon.com/Innovators-Dilemma-Revolutionary-Change-Business/dp/0062060244
- Jobs at Cloudflare: https://www.cloudflare.com/careers/jobs/
- OpenAI: https://openai.com/
- Perplexity: https://www.perplexity.ai/
- Anthropic: anthropic.com
- Ben Smith: https://www.buzzfeed.com/bensmith
- Black Mirror: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Mirror
- Peter Thiel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Thiel
- Eric Schmidt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Schmidt
- Daniel Ek on X: https://x.com/eldsjal
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Production and marketing by Pen Name.
Eric may be an investor in the companies discussed.
