for more responsible technology
"We can't quantify AI's impact, we don't have enough precise data." Oh really? It's largely in reaction to assertions like this that I first set about compiling the above stats, late 2024. Because, whilst a lot of figures floating around are questionable - most famously the assertion that 1 request to ChatGPT uses as much … Continue reading AI’s Impacts, how to limit them, and why (updated)
If you ever thought the people in charge of today's most powerful companies still had values, think again. Any previously-professed good GAFAM intentions went out the window January 20, when Donald Trump became president of the USA, with Big Tech's leaders - the new Broligarchy - at his side. What? How? And above all, why? … Continue reading Welcome to Broligarchy
Announced as “the Olympics of AI”, France’s AI Action Summit, which just ended here in Paris, was supposed to find new meaning for artificial intelligence, notably defining a way for European AI to compete with US and Chinese domination of this still much-hyped sector. In short, it claimed to answer tech bros’ favourite question: how … Continue reading Is AI making the world a worse place?
My biggest wish for 2025: that young people be better protected online. It’s one of the reasons I created this blog in 2018; and today, these concerns are expertly expressed in Jonathan Haidt’s must-read book, The Anxious Generation.What’s the problem? Today, children are "over-protected in the real world and under-protected online", says Haidt.As a result, … Continue reading Helping the ‘Anxious Generation’ back into “discover mode”
This summer I decided to binge both HBO's biting satire "Silicon Valley" and all seven books of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy." Why? Because the latter is frequently cited, notably by tech billionaires, as a work of inspirational genius, whereas the latter? Less so. My two cents were confirmed by my summer rediscoveries of … Continue reading Why “Silicon Valley” is tech reality, and H2G2 its absurd fantasy… not the opposite
The stereotype of the evil boss is older still than Bond villains. But today's tech leaders are actively turning Google's former "don't be evil" motto on its head, making its and Facebook's previous misdemeanours look like child's play. Hold on to your seats... Sam Altman: He who thought he could do anything What would happen … Continue reading Do be evil
Full disclosure: this article was originally published on my current employer's blog Has the the breakneck speed of change and hype since late 2022's ChatGPT-fuelled generative AI explosion given us enough time to fully assess generative AI’s true impact on the planet? Let’s take a look. The impact, in figures First and foremost, it’s now … Continue reading Can AI be sustainable?
In tech, we tend to think our activity is pretty clean. We work on shiny new computers, editing files that live in a pristine cloud… and we’ve replaced so many business trips with GMeets that we can’t impact the planet that much, can we? Think again. Article originally published on Maddyness UK here (and in … Continue reading Why Green IT matters now more than ever
"Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose", French writer Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr famously said in 1849. Fittingly, the more tech changes, the more it stays the same. With the special exception that each hype cycle now seems to spin several magnitudes faster than the previous one... regardless of whether it's based on something true … Continue reading Why we shouldn’t believe (all) the (generative) AI hype
It's news to noone that we're on the brink of climate catastrophe. COP27 was moreorless the letdown it was predicted to be. Former Irish President Mary Robinson even feared that many world leaders there were close to giving up on the Paris Agreement target of limiting global warming to 1.5°C this century. What's tech got … Continue reading Your tech use impacts the planet. Here’s how to reduce it
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