I think it depends on what ways "worse" means. For me, when I'm in my HN bubble, I get to see a lot of websites that are plain, easy to navigate and read. It's a great experience. Outside of my bubble is where it's "worse". I'm inundated with newsletter signups, way too many ads, and a whole lot of fluff SEO and AI based writing, autoplaying videos that follow as I scroll down a page even if it's not playing. Not to mention the frequent paywalls/account necessary sites that seem to be everywhere. There's a consignment e-shop I found one day that required an account to see product info and prices. Thankfully, there are extensions to block a lot of that stuff, but I dont think it should have to be that way.
I don't know about a name for this phenomena, but it is a growing concern, at least for me.
As for the rest of the google search stuff, I started paying for search and it's been the best experience so far.