We expose the real harms of AI systems while countering AI hype.
We make visible the exploited data workers behind AI systems, map “AI”-enabled surveillance world wide, and burst the empty hype being used to inflate the ongoing generative AI bubble.
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Creating natural language processing tools, and using mixed methods (quantitative and qualitative) approaches to analyze the impacts of social media platforms on neglected countries and languages. Watch our short documentary on the topic.
AI is fueled by the artists, writers and “zombie trainers” (see below) supplying training and evaluation data without consent or compensation. Vulnerable populations like refugees and gig workers are hired as data workers under exploitative working conditions (see Data Workers Inquiry). These same vulnerable populations are also the first to experience the harms of AI systems, whether it is through automated weapons or surveillance systems (see Surveillance Watch). This page has more of our research on the inequities fueled by AI systems.
Image: Leo Lau & Digit / https://betterimagesofai.org / https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Big tech companies are throwing money at artificial general intelligence (AGI), with CEOs telling us that it will come, bringing with it utopia, any day now (for the measly price of SEVEN TRILLION DOLLARS according to Sam Altman). How did AGI come to be a dominant goal in AI? What motivates the drive to attempt to build it? This page is dedicated to answering this question, starting with our paper, "The TESCREAL Bundle: Eugenics and the Promise of Utopia through Artificial General Intelligence," which you can read on First Monday. Image is Clarote & AI4Media / Better Images of AI / Power/Profit / CC-BY 4.0
Uncovering the hype behind AI and what we can do about it. In The AI Con, Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna offer a sharp, witty, and wide-ranging take-down of AI hype across its many forms.
Showing the extent to which vulnerable populations like refugees are both exploited laborers fueling “AI” systems and those most harmed by them. Read our papers and articles to learn more.
Focusing on how algorithmic management and workplace surveillance allows corporations like Amazon to steal wages, intensify poor working conditions, and evade responsibility.
This interactive map reveals the intricate connections between surveillance companies, their funding sources and affiliations. Notice missing entries? Submit them on the website. Used the tool for your work, or have other feedback? Let us know!
Examining who benefits from "AI" systems and who is harmed (e.g. read AI for Whom?, AI Art and Its Impact on Artists, AI and Inequality in Hiring).
Artificial Intelligence has too much hype. In this stream, linguist Prof. Emily M. Bender and sociologist Dr. Alex Hanna break down the AI hype, separate fact from fiction, and science from bloviation. They're joined by special guests and talk about everything, from machine consciousness to science fiction, to political economy to art made by machines.