Hub AI and society

Artificial Intelligence is a key technology that can help us solve major societal challenges such as climate change, energy supply, healthcare, education or logistics. AI can solve specific problems more effectively by supporting us in decision-making, automating solutions and thus scaling them, or discovering completely new solutions. But the use of AI also poses new risks, for example when it comes to surveillance or questions of social justice.

What is our society doing with AI – and what is AI doing to our society? We shed light on this question in our AI and Society Content Hub.

AI and society

"Unlimited genius" for all: Altman's naive dream of AI equality

AI and society

Study warns: creeping AI development could lead to our 'gradual disempowerment'

AI and society

OpenAI and Microsoft may be in trouble

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AI and society
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New York City's subway is tackling fare evasion with AI-powered surveillance software. The Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) has installed the technology at seven undisclosed stations to track those who avoid paying their fares.

With an estimated revenue loss of $285 million in 2022 due to fare evasion, the MTA expects to expand the system to about 24 more stations by the end of the year. Spanish AI developer AWAAIT created the software, which detects fare evaders and shares images of them with nearby station agents.

The AI system doesn't report fare evaders to law enforcement, but it's unclear if that could change in the future. The MTA says it's being used "essentially as a counting tool" to assess evasion methods and peak times. The number of police officers in NYC subway stations has increased, leading to more fare evasion arrests, "with a disproportionate impact on black and Hispanic riders," according to The Verge.

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AI and society
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Dave Willner, head of trust and safety at OpenAI, has transitioned to an advisory role after a year and a half in the position. Willner, who previously led trust and safety teams at Facebook and Airbnb, played a significant part in discussions surrounding regulation and responsibility in the AI world after the launch of ChatGPT.

"Anyone with young children and a super intense job can relate to that tension, I think, and these past few months have really crystallized for me that I was going to have to prioritize one or the other," he said in a LinkedIn post.

His departure occurs at a critical time for AI, as OpenAI's president Greg Brockman is meeting with the White House alongside executives from major tech companies to discuss shared safety and transparency goals.

AI and society
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8,000 authors have signed an Authors Guild letter urging the CEOs of major AI companies, including OpenAI, Alphabet, Meta, Stability AI, IBM, and Microsoft, to fairly compensate and recognize authors for the use of their copyrighted works in the training of generative AI technologies. Signatories include Dan Brown, Margaret Atwood, James Patterson, Jennifer Egan, David Baldacci, and other notable authors.

The potential flood of AI-generated content poses a threat to the writing profession, and the Guild calls for collaboration with AI industry leaders to ensure that authors' rights are protected and the profession remains sustainable. The letter emphasizes the need for consent, credit, and compensation for authors whose works form the basis of AI systems such as ChatGPT and Bard. The Guild is threatening a lawsuit, but at this point, Big AI is probably used to that.

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AI and society

OpenAI and Anthropic raise alarm over China's Deepseek in warnings to US government

AI in practice

Google's new AI mode for search might turn the Web into a World Wide Wasteland

AI in practice

Anthropic launches Claude 3.7 Sonnet hybrid AI model and Claude Code programming tool

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