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The Big Nine
- How the Tech Titans and Their Thinking Machines Could Warp Humanity
- Narrated by: Amanda Dolan
- Length: 9 hrs and 35 mins
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Publisher's summary
A call-to-arms about the broken nature of artificial intelligence, and the powerful corporations that are turning the human-machine relationship on its head.
We like to think that we are in control of the future of "artificial" intelligence. The reality, though, is that we - the everyday people whose data powers AI - aren't actually in control of anything. When, for example, we speak with Alexa, we contribute that data to a system we can't see and have no input into - one largely free from regulation or oversight. The big nine corporations - Amazon, Google, Facebook, Tencent, Baidu, Alibaba, Microsoft, IBM and Apple - are the new gods of AI and are short-changing our futures to reap immediate financial gain.
In this book, Amy Webb reveals the pervasive, invisible ways in which the foundations of AI - the people working on the system, their motivations, the technology itself - is broken. Within our lifetimes, AI will, by design, begin to behave unpredictably, thinking and acting in ways which defy human logic. The big nine corporations may be inadvertently building and enabling vast arrays of intelligent systems that don't share our motivations, desires, or hopes for the future of humanity.
Much more than a passionate, human-centered call-to-arms, this book delivers a strategy for changing course, and provides a path for liberating us from algorithmic decision-makers and powerful corporations.
Critic reviews
"Rather than questioning the character of thinking machines, futurist Amy Webb turns a critical eye on the humans behind the computers. With AI's development overwhelmingly driven by nine tech powerhouses, she asks: Is it possible for the technology to serve the best interests of everyone?"—Wired
"Webb's assessments are based on analyses of patent filings, policy briefings, interviews and other sources. She paints vivid pictures of how AI could benefit the average person, via precision medicine or smarter dating apps...Her forecasts are provocative and unsettlingly plausible."—Science News
"Instead of predicting the future, Webb lays out scenarios for optimistic, pragmatic, and catastrophic outcomes -- all extrapolated from current facts. However impractical you may find the idea of a common Apple-Amazon operating system named Applezon, considering potential scenarios is a fantastically healthy exercise, because anyone who tells you they know how AI is going to turn out is lying."—VentureBeat
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Many people today are so dazzled by the long-term potential for artificial intelligence that they overlook the much clearer and more immediate potential for a new form of "collective intelligence": the intelligence of groups of people and computers working together. In Superminds, Thomas Malone explains what we need to do to take advantage of this potential. Groundbreaking and utterly fascinating, Superminds will change the way you work - both with others and with computers - for the better.
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"Why did a Kenyan immigrant win the 2008 election"
- By RealTruth on 07-11-18
By: Thomas W. Malone
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Human + Machine
- Reimagining Work in the Age of AI
- By: Paul R. Daugherty, H. James Wilson
- Narrated by: Jamie Renell
- Length: 5 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Look around you. Artificial intelligence is no longer just a futuristic notion. It's here right now - in software that senses what we need, supply chains that "think" in real time, and robots that respond to changes in their environment. Twenty-first-century pioneer companies are already using AI to innovate and grow fast. The bottom line is this: Businesses that understand how to harness AI can surge ahead. Those that neglect it will fall behind. Which side are you on?
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A golf course book
- By C. Surdak on 07-30-18
By: Paul R. Daugherty, and others
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Artificial Intelligence: 101 Things You Must Know Today About Our Future
- By: Lasse Rouhiainen
- Narrated by: Rodger Paxton
- Length: 8 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Artificial intelligence is changing our world faster than we can imagine, and it will impact every area of our lives. And this is happening whether we like it or not. You might have heard that many jobs will be replaced by automation and robots, but did you also know that at the same time a huge number of new jobs will be created by AI? This book covers many fascinating and timely topics related to artificial intelligence, including: self-driving cars, robots, chatbots, and how AI will impact the job market, business processes, and entire industries, just to name a few.
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Completely useless
- By Joe V on 03-29-19
By: Lasse Rouhiainen
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Thinking Machines
- The Quest for Artificial Intelligence - and Where It's Taking Us Next
- By: Luke Dormehl
- Narrated by: Gus Brown
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
When most of us think about artificial intelligence, our minds go straight to cyborgs, robots, and sci-fi thrillers where machines take over the world. But the truth is that artificial intelligence is already among us. It exists in our smartphones, fitness trackers, and refrigerators that tell us when the milk will expire. In some ways the future people dreamed of at the World's Fair in the 1960s is already here. We're teaching our machines how to think like humans, and they're learning at an incredible rate.
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Mostly platitudes with no depth
- By Gary on 03-24-17
By: Luke Dormehl
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The World Is Flat
- Further Updated and Expanded
- By: Thomas L. Friedman
- Narrated by: Oliver Wyman
- Length: 27 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
When scholars write the history of the world twenty years from now, what will they say was the most crucial development in the first few years of the twenty-first century? The attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11 and the Iraq war? Or the convergence of technology and events that allowed India, China, and so many other countries to become part of the global supply chain for services and manufacturing, creating an explosion of wealth in the middle classes of the world's two biggest nations?
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If you like cliches...
- By Jonathan Shultz on 09-08-07
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System Error
- Where Big Tech Went Wrong and How We Can Reboot
- By: Rob Reich, Mehran Sahami, Jeremy M. Weinstein
- Narrated by: Kaleo Griffith
- Length: 11 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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In no more than the blink of an eye, a naïve optimism about technology’s liberating potential has given way to a dystopian obsession with biased algorithms, surveillance capitalism, and job-displacing robots. System Error exposes the root of our current predicament - how big tech’s relentless focus on optimization is driving a future that reinforces discrimination, erodes privacy, displaces workers, and pollutes the information we get- and outlines steps we can take to change course, renew our democracy, and save ourselves.
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Excellent on tech. Weak on political speech.
- By Kindle Customer on 11-05-21
By: Rob Reich, and others
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Becoming Facebook
- The 10 Challenges That Defined the Company That's Disrupting the World
- By: Mike Hoefflinger
- Narrated by: Nicholas Techosky
- Length: 7 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Facebook's founding is legend: In a Harvard dorm, wunderkind Mark Zuckerberg invented a new way to connect with friends...and the rest is history. But for the people who actually molded this great idea into a game-changing $300 billion company, the experience was far more tumultuous and uncertain than we might expect. Mike Hoefflinger was one of those Facebook insiders.
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mainly a tribute to the success of FB
- By Anonymous User on 10-07-18
By: Mike Hoefflinger
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The Future of the Professions
- How Technology Will Transform the Work of Human Experts
- By: Richard Susskind, Daniel Susskind
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 12 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
This book predicts the decline of today's professions and describes the people and systems that will replace them. In an Internet society, according to Richard Susskind and Daniel Susskind, we will neither need nor want doctors, teachers, accountants, architects, the clergy, consultants, lawyers, and many others to work as they did in the 20th century.
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I Hope It's Not All True
- By John on 05-01-16
By: Richard Susskind, and others
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The Filter Bubble
- What the Internet Is Hiding from You
- By: Eli Pariser
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 7 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In December 2009, Google began customizing its search results for each user. Instead of giving you the most broadly popular result, Google now tries to predict what you are most likely to click on. According to MoveOn.org board president Eli Pariser, Google's change in policy is symptomatic of the most significant shift to take place on the Web in recent years: the rise of personalization.
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Now in the top 3 best books I've ever read
- By Brian Esserlieu on 05-26-11
By: Eli Pariser
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Average is Over
- Powering America Beyond the Age of the Great Stagnation
- By: Tyler Cowen
- Narrated by: Andrew Garman
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
The widening gap between rich and poor means dealing with one big, uncomfortable truth: If you're not at the top, you're at the bottom. The global labor market is changing radically thanks to growth at the high end and the low. About three quarters of the jobs created in the United States since the great recession pay only a bit more than minimum wage. Still, the United States has more millionaires and billionaires than any country ever, and we continue to mint them.
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Disappointing analysis of future
- By JKBart on 12-10-13
By: Tyler Cowen
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T-Minus AI
- Humanity's Countdown to Artificial Intelligence and the New Pursuit of Global Power
- By: Michael Kanaan
- Narrated by: Braden Wright
- Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In T-Minus AI: Humanity's Countdown to Artificial Intelligence and the New Pursuit of Global Power, author Michael Kanaan explains the realities of AI from a human-oriented perspective that's easy to comprehend. A recognized national expert and the U.S. Air Force's first Chairperson for Artificial Intelligence, Kanaan weaves a compelling new view on our history of innovation and technology to masterfully explain what each of us should know about modern computing, AI, and machine learning.
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Trivial Book Regarding AI
- By AstroMan on 10-30-20
By: Michael Kanaan
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Big Data in Practice
- How 45 Successful Companies Used Big Data Analytics to Deliver Extraordinary Results
- By: Bernard Marr
- Narrated by: Piers Hampton
- Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
The best-selling author of Big Data is back, this time with a unique and in-depth insight into how specific companies use big data. Big data is on the tip of everyone's tongue. Everyone understands its power and importance, but many fail to grasp the actionable steps and resources required to utilise it effectively. This book fills the knowledge gap by showing how major companies are using big data every day, from an up-close, on-the-ground perspective.
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Good book for managers
- By Capnbody on 01-08-18
By: Bernard Marr
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Program or Be Programmed
- Ten Commands for a Digital Age
- By: Douglas Rushkoff
- Narrated by: Douglas Rushkoff
- Length: 3 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In 10 chapters, composed of 10 "commands", Rushkoff provides cyber enthusiasts and technophobes alike with the guidelines to navigate the digital new universe. In this spirited, accessible poetics of new media, Rushkoff picks up where Marshall McLuhan left off, helping listeners to recognize programming as the new literacy of the digital age - and as a template through which to see beyond social conventions and power structures that have vexed us for centuries.
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Good book, but with some crazy ranting
- By Bjarne on 02-05-15
By: Douglas Rushkoff
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Good book, awful narrator
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By: Amy Webb
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Thought provoking but politically biased
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Today's "machine-learning" systems, trained by data, are so effective that we've invited them to see and hear for us - and to make decisions on our behalf. But alarm bells are ringing. Systems cull résumés until, years later, we discover that they have inherent gender biases. Algorithms decide bail and parole - and appear to assess black and white defendants differently. We can no longer assume that our mortgage application, or even our medical tests, will be seen by human eyes. And autonomous vehicles on our streets can injure or kill.
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Clear and thought provoking
- By Amazon Customer on 02-14-22
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In Artificial Unintelligence, Meredith Broussard argues that our collective enthusiasm for applying computer technology to every aspect of life has resulted in a tremendous amount of poorly designed systems. We are so eager to do everything digitally - hiring, driving, paying bills, even choosing romantic partners - that we have stopped demanding that our technology actually work. Broussard, a software developer and journalist, reminds us that there are fundamental limits to what we can (and should) do with technology.
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Good but not the best
- By Jordan Worley on 08-07-19
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The Master Algorithm
- How the Quest for the Ultimate Learning Machine Will Remake Our World
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Under the aegis of machine learning in our data-driven machine age, computers are programming themselves and learning about - and solving - an extraordinary range of problems, from the mundane to the most daunting. Today it is machine learning programs that enable Amazon and Netflix to predict what users will like, Apple to power Siri's ability to understand voices, and Google to pilot cars.
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Great book, irritating narration
- By N. G. PEPIN on 09-24-15
By: Pedro Domingos
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Algorithms of Oppression
- How Search Engines Reinforce Racism
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- Narrated by: Shayna Small
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Run a Google search for “black girls” - what will you find? “Big Booty” and other sexually explicit terms are likely to come up as top search terms. But, if you type in “white girls”, the results are radically different. The suggested porn sites and un-moderated discussions about “why black women are so sassy” or “why black women are so angry” presents a disturbing portrait of black womanhood in modern society. In Algorithms of Oppression, Safiya Umoja Noble challenges the idea that search engines like Google offer an equal playing field for all forms of ideas, identities, and activities.
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Read this book. Tell everyone you know about it.
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Good book, awful narrator
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By: Amy Webb
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The Genesis Machine
- Our Quest to Rewrite Life in the Age of Synthetic Biology
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Clear and thought provoking
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Good but not the best
- By Jordan Worley on 08-07-19
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The Master Algorithm
- How the Quest for the Ultimate Learning Machine Will Remake Our World
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Great book, irritating narration
- By N. G. PEPIN on 09-24-15
By: Pedro Domingos
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Algorithms of Oppression
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Read this book. Tell everyone you know about it.
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T-Minus AI
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Trivial Book Regarding AI
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Weapons of Math Destruction
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We live in the age of the algorithm. Increasingly, the decisions that affect our lives—where we go to school, whether we can get a job or a loan, how much we pay for health insurance—are being made not by humans, but by machines. In theory, this should lead to greater fairness: Everyone is judged according to the same rules.
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More are US social problems that WMD
- By Laurent Bourgault-Roy on 01-08-17
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After yet another online dating disaster, Amy Webb was about to cancel her JDate membership when an epiphany struck: It wasn’t that her standards were too high, as women are often told, but that she wasn’t evaluating the right data in suitors’ profiles. That night Webb, an award-winning journalist and digital-strategy expert, made a detailed, exhaustive list of what she did and didn’t want in a mate.
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Fun story, but not a how-to
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By: Amy Webb
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Superminds
- The Surprising Power of People and Computers Thinking Together
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Many people today are so dazzled by the long-term potential for artificial intelligence that they overlook the much clearer and more immediate potential for a new form of "collective intelligence": the intelligence of groups of people and computers working together. In Superminds, Thomas Malone explains what we need to do to take advantage of this potential. Groundbreaking and utterly fascinating, Superminds will change the way you work - both with others and with computers - for the better.
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"Why did a Kenyan immigrant win the 2008 election"
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By: Thomas W. Malone
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The word "glitch" implies an incidental error, as easy to patch up as it is to identify. But what if racism, sexism, and ableism aren't just bugs in mostly functional machinery—what if they're coded into the system itself? Meredith Broussard demonstrates in More Than a Glitch how neutrality in tech is a myth and why algorithms need to be held accountable. Broussard, a data scientist and one of the few Black female researchers in artificial intelligence, masterfully synthesizes concepts from computer science and sociology.
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Race After Technology
- Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code
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From everyday apps to complex algorithms, Ruha Benjamin cuts through tech-industry hype to understand how emerging technologies can reinforce white supremacy and deepen social inequity. Benjamin argues that automation, far from being a sinister story of racist programmers scheming on the dark web, has the potential to hide, speed up, and deepen discrimination while appearing neutral and even benevolent when compared to the racism of a previous era.
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the narration is awful
- By Sofi on 01-04-22
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Rebooting AI
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Two leaders in the field offer a compelling analysis of the current state of the art and reveal the steps we must take to achieve a truly robust artificial intelligence. Taking inspiration from the human mind, professors Gary Marcus and Ernest Davis explain what we need to advance AI to the next level, and suggest that if we are wise along the way, we won't need to worry about a future of machine overlords. Rebooting AI provides a lucid, clear-eyed assessment of the current science and offers an inspiring vision of how a new generation of AI can make our lives better.
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Not very technical
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Future Crimes
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Technological advances have benefited our world in immeasurable ways, but there is an ominous flip side: our technology can be turned against us. Hackers can activate baby monitors to spy on families, thieves are analyzing social media posts to plot home invasions, and stalkers are exploiting the GPS on smart phones to track their victims’ every move. We all know today’s criminals can steal identities, drain online bank accounts, and wipe out computer servers, but that’s just the beginning.
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The book for all of us to help protect us
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The Future Is Faster Than You Think
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In their book Abundance, best-selling authors and futurists Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler tackled grand global challenges, such as poverty, hunger, and energy. Then, in Bold, they chronicled the use of exponential technologies that allowed the emergence of powerful new entrepreneurs. Now the best-selling authors are back with The Future Is Faster Than You Think, a blueprint for how our world will change in response to the next 10 years of rapid technological disruption.
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Totally Mixed on This One
- By D. Sooley on 02-03-20
By: Peter H. Diamandis, and others
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Design Justice
- Community-Led Practices to Build the Worlds We Need
- By: Sasha Costanza-Chock
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This book explores the theory and practice of design justice, demonstrates how universalist design principles and practices erase certain groups of people - specifically, those who are intersectionally disadvantaged or multiply burdened under the matrix of domination (white supremacist heteropatriarchy, ableism, capitalism, and settler colonialism) - and invites listeners to "build a better world, a world where many worlds fit; linked worlds of collective liberation and ecological sustainability".
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A must read for all designers
- By Eric Warner on 11-30-23
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AI 2041
- Ten Visions for Our Future
- By: Kai-Fu Lee, Chen Qiufan
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin, Justin Chien, Soneela Nankani, and others
- Length: 18 hrs and 4 mins
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AI will be the defining development of the 21st century. Within two decades, aspects of daily human life will be unrecognizable. AI will generate unprecedented wealth, revolutionize medicine and education through human-machine symbiosis, and create brand-new forms of communication and entertainment. In liberating us from routine work, however, AI will also challenge the organizing principles of our economic and social order.
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Good concept, poor execution
- By Amazon Customer on 12-08-21
By: Kai-Fu Lee, and others
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Our Final Invention
- Artificial Intelligence and the End of the Human Era
- By: James Barrat
- Narrated by: Gary Dana
- Length: 9 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Artificial Intelligence helps choose what books you buy, what movies you see, and even who you date. It puts the "smart" in your smartphone and soon it will drive your car. It makes most of the trades on Wall Street, and controls vital energy, water, and transportation infrastructure. But Artificial Intelligence can also threaten our existence. In as little as a decade, AI could match and then surpass human intelligence. Corporations and government agencies are pouring billions into achieving AI’s Holy Grail - human-level intelligence.
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Kind of chilling
- By Keegan on 04-11-15
By: James Barrat
What listeners say about The Big Nine
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Kathy
- 03-26-19
Interesting but Frustrating
This should have been be a five star book. Amy Webb is smart, engaging and knowledgeable. Ironically, it is when her own biases grow so strong that her predictions loose all credibility.
I do not agree with Webb's foundational thinking. For example, a major Webb warning is based on the idea that AI is being developed by small tribes of men lacking diversity. Microsoft, more than 20 years ago, employed people from all over the world. Tech companies are diverse. Tech companies care about intellectual horsepower above all else and they search the globe for the best and brightest. It is not about country, education, religion, being neurotypical or personal hygiene. Webb predicts this narrow tribe of similar men will forget about transgender people who will be forced into humiliating situations. That's not likely. I remember a man sending a letter to everyone in his building explaining he would be using the woman's restroom while going through the long process of changing his gender. He was considered courageous and this was in the last millennia.
Webb predicts these similar men will only hire more men like them in the future. That is an absurd prediction from someone who spends time thinking about the future. Girls, future women, are surpassing boys. Most collages have more girls than boys. For the ivy league, it can be as high as eight qualified girl applicants to one boy. Volunteer in a classroom and it will not take long to see how much better girls are doing than boys.
More importantly, Webb's predictions about China are incredibly offensive. In Webb's catastrophic scenario China AIs kill every American. Readers visualize children dying in our arms before we die from China's AIs. This was just gross. Webb herself talks about China not having political problems with other countries. She talks about China helping other countries with roads and infrastructure and this is true. China does not want to kill all Americans. This was one of the most disappointing things I have ever read. This is not consistent with China's historical roots and is manipulative in a dangerous way.
I gave the book three stars because the beginning is good. It is a shame that while Webb predicts the bias of software engineers will be a huge problem, it is her own bias that destroys what could have been a great book.
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- McKane
- 03-13-19
Trusting to a Fault
The perspective taken with respect to the G-MAFIA is largely uncritical and overly hopeful. Rather than delve into the corrupting influence of profit on the G-MAFIA (e.g. Russian involvement in the 2016 election via Facebook and pedophilia group formation mediated by the YouTube recommendation algorithms), the author pins these shortcomings generally on social pressures to produce advanced AI applications (there's no support for this claim given). This perspective then taints the whole argument of the book, which is that we need to support the G-MAFIA in AI development rather than regulate or file for anti-trust suits. As an AI researcher in this space, I have seen absolutely no indication that the G-MAFIA actually ever esteems the public good over their bottom line, so to assume that if we simply stop expecting big advances in AI (and that the companies are made sufficiently diverse) is not only irresponsible, it's dangerous.
My other main gripe with this book is that China's soon to be preeminence in AI is used to justify nearly every proposed course of action. I for one am certainly terrified of China's AI plan, but I don't think that it justifies throwing caution to the wind by simply trusting the G-MAFIA to fight the good fight if they pick up enough diversity (this is the only mechanism of changing the G-MAFIA that the author argues for).
All-in-all, the author gives a decent run-down of current AI capabilities and provides some thoughtful discussion of where AI is headed, but the very premise of the argument seems, to me at least, to be up for debate. It would have been nice to see at least some of that debate in this work.
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- Jeffrey D
- 01-06-20
Not much thought put into this book
I could not finish this book. She tells us that China is growing fast. That there are big companies using AI. That developers tend to be white people. That AI is to some extent a black box. But I did not see any particular insight into AI. It was more a book about bias and what she calls, in pop-sociology, "tribes." But if you pretend to write about one subject, and really write about another, the danger is that the real topic will be one the author does not know much about. I admit that I got less than halfway through the book before remembering that I am not going to live forever.
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- David Larson
- 04-04-19
Best AI book I've read since Bostrom
The title is a little misleading. it's not just about the big 9. It's about politics and society and how other countries (China) are outcompeting us in AI and will very soon overtake the US. This book is a big wake up call. The American military spends too much on hardware (because that's where the lobby money is) and not enough on scientific research (especially into AI). China has our number. Unfortunately I don't see a scenario where we reform our corrupt appropriations system in time not to become a servant to China by around mid-century. Good book though.
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- Tony
- 10-03-20
Wow
This book is racist. It’s unbelievably one sided and offers a militaristic strategy to fend off an imminent attack by China in all the scenarios presented. It is written in an “us” vs “them” framework, and is difficult to listen to. The intro offers a pretty good recap of AI and displays some of the critical lack of diversity in the American tech sector, but this is the book’s only strength. I believe the scenarios presented in this book are myopic and dangerously racist.
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- Andrew Mazibrada
- 02-28-20
Some good points, but naive and one-sided
Some good points made, and a somewhat useful summary of the BAT, but all Webb's points are dealt with in more detail in better works on AI ethics and futures. Webb's analysis is naive, simplistic, and lacking balance. She places too much trust in the altruism of the G-Mafia, rejects regulation of any kind, asserts the need for a coalition that is not in the commercial interests of the G-Mafia and which flies in the face of everything we know about cognitive biases and business practices (take one look at climate change and see that businesses put businesses first even in the serious position we are now in), adopts a frighteningly McCarthyist paranoia in respect of China, and is deeply enmeshed in free-market solutions and innovation as the answer to all our problems, despite the powerful critiques of capitalism in many recent works on AI. No mention is made of Shoshana Zuboff's work on Surveillance Capitalism which, given Webb's stance, ought to have been dealt with in some way (Zuboff's theories predate Webb's publication, even though the books were released within months of each other). This highlights what I assert is a quite unscholarly work - she asks us to trust her in her analysis of the G-Mafia, as though her place as a trusted insider gives her value, without offering us evidence to support that trust. She continually uses adverbs like 'admirably' to describe their conduct, especially that of Google, which flies in the face of what Zuboff's far more detailed and scholarly work offers us. Essentially, Zuboff backs up her claims with evidence. Webb does not. There are better books.
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- matthew
- 02-03-23
Sanctamonious author
The first half of the book features some excellent examples that are easy to follow and logical. However, the 2nd. part features a four chapter diatribe that pitches optimistic, pragmatic and catostrophic outcomes as they relate to the pregression of Ai from narrow intelligence to an all encompassing utility that basically wants to optimize human beings as if they are machines is both creepy and intolerable. In the final chapter the writer suggests Canada would be a great place to lead AI meetings. I am sure the scientists now residing in sunny California will want to visit the frigid French influence Quebec, because they will be free of any bias whatsoever. The internet wants to make everyone accepting of all ideologies and lifestyles, a kind of omnivorous culture, but in so many ways a good thing has gone off the rails. There are many people who want free will and do not conform so readily to technology. AI may be computationally superior in some narrow tasks than humans, but computers are a reflection of mankind, which is at best fallible and prone to errors, so whatever plan to make people conform and obey will likely be met with staunch resistance, unless people are blissfully hypnotized into a kind of zombie apocolypse, which could also be a possible outcome. I dont subscribe to idealouges and their platitudes and will fail to comply with directives that strive to curtail my individuality and so should you.
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- William
- 11-13-21
The coming conflict
We use artificial intelligence every day, though we may not always know it. AI is what determines what should be on your FB page. It’s how you can type just a few words into Google and find an almost instant answer to almost any question. It schedules flights, trains, traffic lights, and predicts the weather. It is the backbone of our financial systems, the power grid, and the retail supply chain. But, where is it going from here? It has certainly improved our lives in many ways. But, it has also brought many unexpected (and sometimes, expected but ignored) problems and as AI makes more and more decisions for us, how do we know that it will make the better decisions? Will it eventually get so smart that it learns to manipulate us and is that already happening in social media? Then there are the various movie scenarios where robots try to take over the world, from “2001” to “iRobot.”
Amy Webb wrote this book because she sees the potential for tremendous good as well as danger. She starts with an overview of the history and present situation of AI in the US and China. She then gives us three potential future scenarios, one optimistic, one pragmatic, and one catastrophic. Finally she suggests concrete actions that we can take to ensure that the path AI takes is the optimistic scenario.
Amy focuses on what she calls the Big Nine companies that are at the forefront of developing AI. Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, IBM and Apple, of which she collectively uses the acronym G-MAFIA are American and Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent (acronym BAT), are Chinese. The American’s may have gotten a slight head start, but the US keeps scrimping and cutting back on basic research. The mantra seems to be that we don’t need government to pick and choose winners and should let the free market do that for us. That may hold true for the implementation of what is learned from that research, but there are some things that government should direct. To do otherwise means that we are turning the future of our nation over to Wall Street (which really controls corporate boards) and those profit interests do not always align with what’s best for the nation as a whole, for our individual liberties, our communities, and our democratic ideals.
Meanwhile, China is pouring tons of resources into AI research and that is tied to China’s ambitions to become the sole world superpower. Webb notes that in July 2017, the Chinese government unveiled its Next Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan to become the global leader in AI by the year 2030. AI is based not on programming but on allowing computers to learn from data and China’s massive population of 1.4 billion citizens gives it the largest natural resource in the era of AI: human data. Since China doesn’t have the privacy and security restrictions of the United States and Europe, they have unfettered access to purer data. China has always controlled the media but past efforts amounted to clumsy sloganeering. Now, it can respond quickly to any shift in public opinion and it sees AI as a way to shape the news to spread positive information that supports the current political direction.
So, the middle part of the book gives three different scenarios for the future and the third one is very bleak, but not in the way that Hollywood has envisioned. Webb imagines a future, not of robots taking over, but of autocratic systems controlling our experience and understanding in such a way that people will naturally accept that new order, and it looks a lot like China today on steroids.
Based on this, Webb suggests a better alternative, that we step up and put money into basic research and develop a rational, cohesive strategy.
I found myself both agreeing and disagreeing with Webb in so many ways as I read this book. She clearly shows how advances in AI have already benefited us and will benefit us even more, particularly in areas like healthcare, construction, communications, and so many other professions. At the same time, I cringed at some of her other descriptions of the “improvements” that it would bring. There was too much emphasis on simplifying our lives and making things easier for us, and I am one who is an early adopter of AI products. I am sitting under a floor lamp that is programmed to change to a warmer color of light in the evenings and start dimming around 11:00 to remind me that it’s time to get to bed. I also felt that Webb seemed to put too much faith in the potential for technology and algorithms to take us in the directions that we really want to go and I don’t really see us developing into AI “tribes” divided by which corporation we follow.
But, I found myself in strong agreement with her analysis of the pervasive, invisible ways in which the foundations on which AI is built — from the people working on the system, to their motivations, to the algorithms used, and even to the faith that so many of its builders have in it — is broken. I agree strongly with her passionate call to change course, to increase fundamental research, to liberate us from the algorithmic control of powerful corporations and the CEOs who use it only to increase their profits and market share with little thought of the effect on our community, on people, and on our democracy. Where does the money come from? We are the nation that landed on the moon and that’s only one of our huge grand-scale investments over history. The trans-continental railway was a massive investment and most of that came from government grants and at a time when the west was still quite wild. It was also at a time when our nation was not rich and in fact had just come through an extremely costly Civil War. But, we didn’t see it as an expense. It was an investment. Today, we are among the wealthiest nations and yet we are among the stingiest in terms of research and infrastructure among developed nations. Private corporations will only invest in what benefits them. We need to invest in what benefits the US and all its people. And, whether you completely buy into Webb’s scenarios or not, there is still enough in what is already happening that should tell us that it’s time to step in.
So, do I recommend this book. I’d give a qualified “yes.” She did well at explaining the problem and summarizing the current situation and that is serious enough that more people should understand it. I was less impressed with her three scenarios. I can see some of the directions that she is describing and agree to many of the dangers and benefits, but felt that it was too simplistic and distracted from the main point. As for her recommendations, I again agree to a point. We need to be willing to invest in things that benefit us and that defend our nation and this is certainly one of those things. Future wars may well be fought more with AI than with missiles and armies. But, I don’t have as much faith in algorithms as she does. But, her main point is still valid. It’s time to act and we need to realize that we are already behind the curve on this one.
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- Ivan b
- 08-04-21
Starts good but fails to hold on to that
The book begins with interesting facts about A.I. In the first chapters it it fails to hold on to that and turns into a SJW diary
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- Ru52
- 08-23-20
For a gloomy future, this book is pretty funny
Funny in a silly way.
For US to defeat China, we must convert all flat earthers, anti vaxers, have left agree with the right - all before 2030 global domination of China deadline.
IBM as a AI superpower is another silly statement, IMHO. ( Watson was, and would be if it didn't come with the requirement for IBM hardware)
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