TechStuff
You Didn't Get a Vote on AI's Future. Someone's Fighting to Change That - The Story
17 Jun 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life?
That is not the look of an innocent man.
Is everyone lying to me about who they are?
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Chapter 2: What are the current public perceptions of AI in America?
We should be skeptics, not even realists. But is the opportunity that is afforded by these digital technologies something that could touch every human on the planet? Of course not. It could touch all of us in our pockets in this moment, even in relatively poor countries where people have mobile technologies. This is a technology that could be helpful for opportunities. So
I think the answer to your question is don't blindly believe what you're being sold by people who have something to sell you, but absolutely feel that there is something that you could use and do because actually on the upside of this, the opportunity side still remains that for any human, they have more access to more information, more opportunity in a variety of different ways by virtue of what's in their pocket than ever before.
And we shouldn't lose sight of those possibilities. They just aren't front and center right now.
I want to ask you about the work you did earlier in your career around digital natives and the digital divide, like people who grew up before the internet essentially and then had to adjust to its norms, felt like the kind of technological infrastructure of everyday life was not for them.
Now, it feels like most people in the world feel like the non-digital natives felt in the early 2000s, right? Most people have this feeling, this is not for me. What can you learn about that earlier time of technological adoption that applies today?
Yeah, a couple of things. And I was smiling as you and Michelle were talking about the early days of Craigslist or eBay or other early technologies. So I'm thinking about 25 years ago. And the approach that we all took was to say, let's let a thousand flowers bloom. Let's have basically no regulation. Let's see how this goes. And there were positive things that came of that.
Of course, we can go through those. But there also were a bunch of negative things that came about that. Some of the harms to children were which I've been concerned about for 25 years, whether that was social media or AI today, totally plain that there are harms to children through these technologies.
They're totally plain that there is room for healthy forms of regulation that could, in fact, drive innovation. Think about the car. By having people put seatbelts on, we actually caused innovation in the car industry by virtue of regulating it. The same is true here. Think about drug discovery in the U.S. By virtue of forms of regulation, we can help prompt innovation innovation in various ways.
We need to apply those good smarts to this technology. And at a moment where a lot of people, I think, politically are starting to think, this isn't a great deal. This could take away my job.
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Chapter 3: How is Humanity AI aiming to shape the future of artificial intelligence?
Bernie Sanders has said, quote, the creative work of millions of people has essentially been stolen by some of the wealthiest people in the world and call for an American AI sovereign wealth fund, which interestingly, Trump is also talking about and as is Sam Altman. So that's kind of a weird mind bender.
But, you know, you have government, you have religion, you have philanthropy, obviously capital and capital markets, private companies, these six or seven individuals you mentioned. How will this shake out and how should it shake out?
One of the ways that we see and when we think about the future and where we know we will be successful, it's not the question of can civil society affect what's happening in AI governance or in what the future looks like, but you see actually the expectations and the rules and the questions that civil society organizations want to see happen. Great example.
We've been working for many years on kids' online safety and harms. But recently, for the first time, you're seeing courts catch up and actually say, there's regulation, there's harm here, and that we actually have a background on consumer safety and information that we know exists. harm was caused, there is some liability here, and we need to see some change.
That is civil society saying it is unacceptable for our children to be harmed in this way. And so what then happens? You create something new. There are social media platforms like Spill and New Public from Eli Fraser and so many others who are building alternatives, who are saying we don't need the same extractive engagement models of the past.
And so I think Humanity AI and philanthropy stands up and says, government has a role to play, even if they've abdicated that role, to be fair and honest. Corporations have a shareholder mentality. They're constantly looking at that as their main incentives.
And so who is thinking about and who is putting capital and ideas and resources behind the questions that you and I, Oz, may have around healthcare, around science, around education? in a way that is not designed to harm or to extract value, but simply to help. And so that's where philanthropy comes in. That's where humanity AI comes in.
And we see that that is our role to catalyze that space, those organizations and those leaders who can help to push us forward.
I mean, $500 million on the one hand is a lot of money. On the other hand, compared to a trillion dollars times three, not so much. How do you get impact with so much power and money maybe pulling in opposite direction to you?
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Chapter 4: What backgrounds do the guests bring to the discussion on AI?
I mean, we think about the moment that we're in with a consolidation of power and of resource and money in a relatively few, and that's not just true in the U.S., but it is true around the world. But we also see that when large groups of people hold up their hand and say, we don't want this, this is actually not who we are. We want to be a different kind of people.
And I think we're seeing that to some degree in that America's 250th and how we're reacting to that. We want to be a community of people who come across to do things even when we're different. Michelle and I come from very different family backgrounds. We are working deeply together, arm in arm on this issue. And that can happen from, you know, any number of different ways.
And that's part of the American story. So I feel like there is a possibility. that by virtue of supporting civil society in the way we are, we can get into the kinds of grants that we're making early on. We're doing an open call coming up where we will learn from others who are working in this, that we can tap into some great power sources. The Pope's encyclical is no small thing.
There are many other people with a great deal of power who are also saying, let's actually focus on some humanistic sources. topics here, and that's important.
But I actually think this is about galvanizing bottom-up support for the kinds of voices that need to be at the table in shaping this, the kinds of creative ideas that one person or one small group can come up with and can change the world. All of those things still hold. All of those things are still true.
And that's where philanthropy has its magic, because we invest without looking at the financial return. We're looking at the value of this creative idea and the next best thing. So somebody coming to us looking for a Not interested, just because everybody wants to do something on AI.
If you've got some really incredible creative idea that's going to be a breakthrough or a group of people who do, that's where we need to be investing.
You know, Oz, I was an English major.
Me too.
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Chapter 5: Why do many people mistrust and dislike AI technologies?
John, what about the Distributed AI Research Institute and the AI Civics led by Data and Society?
Two wonderful things, although to hear Michelle rhapsodize about the kinfolk and James Baldwin, I cannot imagine. I cannot compete in describing, although I will say this work is equally brilliant and wonderful. But Distributed AI Research Network is one that we've supported for a long time, I think literally from its inception at MacArthur, but we're delighted as part of the Humanity AI group.
Tamit Gebru is an amazing PhD computer scientist. Former Googler, right? Former Googler. And in fact, she was let go by Google quite famously.
She was let go by Google because of her criticisms, essentially.
Yes. And she is among those who have been in leading positions in tech companies who have emerged as the most powerful critics. Anyway, what Timmy did was she set up a distributed, what's in the name, AI research network that actually is global.
And it is people who have amazing expertise on a range of topics who have stood up something that is a research network of a different sort that is absolutely bringing some of the most information, most powerful information and insights and knowledge forward about this set of technologies. And so, among other things, they're working on the topic of linguistic diversity.
So how do you ensure that the use of this doesn't just make English the lingua franca for the history of the world, right? In fact, it has huge power. in terms of preserving local knowledge as well as local languages around the world. But it doesn't always pay, right? That's not something that these companies are always going to be able to do. So to me, there's been a powerful voice around that.
You mentioned AI and civics. So one thing that I think Michelle said earlier so nicely was there are lots of people who are positionally able to do something about this, but don't really have the on-ramps or the way to do it. And so the AI civics effort is slightly different.
is we've teamed up with two organizations, one in New York City, Data and Society, another distributed effort, although the person's based here in Chicago in the Midwest, called the Digital Public Library of America. And the effort here is to say, let's think particularly about libraries and librarians.
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Chapter 6: Is it too late to be optimistic about AI's future?
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Listen to Joy 101 with Hoda Kotb on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, I'm PJ Vogt. My podcast, Search Engine, has a new two-part series for you. Of all the new technologies coming out of AI, the most transformative one might be driverless cars. They're already on the road in 10 American cities, and they're quickly coming to more. We tell the story of how we got here.
The secret team at Google that spent 15 years building what might be the safest vehicle on the road, and we cover the fights brewing in blue cities, where unions and politicians are working to keep those cars off the streets. Listen to Search Engine wherever you get your podcasts.
Humans will never be more intelligent than AI.
There's going to be two types of companies. Those are great at AI and those that went out of business because they weren't.
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