I can think of many reasons to bother. In the context of the article being discussed, it can be argued that Google is presenting sites' content without clear at

I can think of many reasons to bother. In the context of the article being discussed, it can be argued that Google is presenting sites' content without clear attribution. Preventing the need for the user to click-through also limits ad revenue (where applicable). Either would be a perfectly good reason to consider alternatives. It's a massive trade off, of course, given Google's position but I don't think decentralized search is a bad goal.