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When leading AI journalist Karen Hao began covering OpenAI in 2019, she thought they were the good guys.
Founded as a non-profit devoted to ensuring that artificial general intelligence (AGI) would benefit all of humanity, the mission rapidly gave way to commercial pressures, peer competition and fierce hoarding of resources.
In Empire of AI – which became an instant New York Times bestseller and saw her recognised on the TIME100 AI List – Hao explores OpenAI’s meteoric rise and its astonishing human, material and environmental impact.
And, with its seemingly relentless extraction of resources, labour and land largely from the Global South, Hao likens the industry to colonial empires of old.
She joins Dr Kerry McInerney (Ngāti Ruanui) to discuss her ground-breaking book.
Supported by Platinum Patron Theresa Gattung.
