We're 30 minutes from the beginning of RE:WIRED—a series of virtual conversations about humanity's biggest bets. You can register and watch at the link, but we'll be live tweeting today's events below: wired.trib.al/Rc5MO3q#REWIRED2021
Kai Fu Lee shares his optimism about AI in health care, but says there will still be challenges in the short term. "I actually don't see much of the downside of AI in healthcare. It's one of the few win-wins." - @kaifulee
Kai-Fu Lee says we need to move away from "explain the black box perfectly or we can't use it." If AI were easily explainable, it wouldn't be so powerful.
Yoky Matsuoka, cofounder of Google X, former CTO of Nest, and neurorobotics researcher, is live now. Watch right here: wired.trib.al/Rc5MO3q#REWIRED2021
Yoky Matsuoka talks about how AI can not only provide health care data and better predictive measures, but allow people to have increased independence without constant care.
Yoky Matsuoka reminds us it's okay to delegate—whether that's with family or friends or AI itself. "It's okay to get help from a human and tech combination. It's not scary and it can help make things better."
Is AI ready to takeover all home tasks? Matsuoka says she believes humans should still be the gatekeepers, but AI can be helpful in process and suggestions.
Next up: Jony Ive speaks to Anna Wintour about his new endeavors, priorities, and the very nature of creativity, ideas, and the future of design as he sees it.
"I struggled to get my head around, with iPod, that it's been 20 years," says Jony Ive. "What the iPod really marked was the beginning of creating far more specific products and devices." wired.trib.al/Rc5MO3q#REWIRED2021
Jony Ive discusses how the arrival of the wearable marks technology becoming more personal and intimate. The next phase: tech that "disappears beneath our skin."
On the late Steve Jobs, "As I think about him, my sense of him and what his contribution truly was, has grown and evolved," says Ive. "I've never met anyone more truly curious, more inquisitive, than Steve."
"If you create with love and genuine care, it's a way of expressing our gratitude for the species," says Ive, when asked about his company's name LoveFrom,
"It's so good in so many ways, we make the mistake of using it as a surrogate for actual communication." -Jony Ive on the danger of digital communication.
"Video connections do not encourage us to be quiet and thoughtful."
"Some of the tools that are most powerful, when we look at history, we find they are the most destructive." says Ive. "I do hope the world my boys grow into there's just a little more surprise and wonder and an awful lot less cynical dogma."
Next up: @TimnitGebru sits down with @tsimonite to discuss the flimsy oversight of tech industry AI projects, and how AI can benefit everyone in society, not just the few.
Gebru says that prioritizing publishing puts technologists in the position of putting out fires instead of thinking ahead. "The problem is right now we haven't been able to put out our imagination about what the future of AI could be like."
"Hope is a discipline," says Gebru. She says the incentive structure for AI research needs to shift from making the powerful more powerful to lifting a diverse range of voices. wired.trib.al/Rc5MO3q#REWIRED2021
Gebru says the problem isn't about getting people started in STEM earlier—the problem is the system they're being brought into. "If you bring people into a faulty system that's just going to destroy them, that's a form of turture."
What is the real cost of a lie on the internet—to ourselves, our communities, our societies?
These speakers know a thing or two about that. Tune in for the next session of RE:WIRED at 4PM EST right here: wired.trib.al/Rc5MO3q#REWIRED2021
Prince Harry. Renee Diresta. Rashad Robinson. Steven Levy. We're 15 minutes away from their session on the cost of a lie on the internet. Watch live right here: wired.trib.al/Rc5MO3q#REWIRED2021
"Self-regulated companies are unregulated companies" says Rashad Robinson. "People in charge will always choose growth and profit over integrity and security."
Prince Harry says the issue isn't too big to solve—it's a small number of accounts causing a huge number of problems. "More than 70% of the hate speech about my wife on Twitter can be traced to 50 accounts."
When asked if he has spoken to the big tech CEOs, Prince Harry says he had emailed Twitter CEO @jack . "I warned Jack that a coup was being staged on the day before (Jan 5), and I haven't heard from him since." -Prince Harry
"We will always lose the opportunity to create real change in the backrooms if people aren't aligned at the front door,"says Rashad Robinson. "It will require all of us to create real change."
Renee Diresta reminds that it's not just tech CEOs that hold power, but tech workers themselves who can put pressure on the people at the top from the inside.
"It's not just a social media problem, it's a media problem," says Prince Harry. "If the media is supposed to be holding us to account, who is holding them to account? It's become kind of a digital dictatorship."
"I think we're moving in the right direction, but I'm not sure I'm necessarily optimistic," says Renee DiResta. "I'm concerned that the normal way to participate online is to participate in the amplification of propaganda."
That's it from RE:WIRED Day One! Join us tomorrow for conversations with Stephane Bancel, Beeple, Jen Easterly, Neal Stephenson, John Cho, and more: wired.trib.al/aW5KtCT#REWIRED2021
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EXCLUSIVE: Canvassers for California representative Michelle Steel are suing the congresswoman's campaign, America PAC, and others, alleging that they were promised hourly wages, then told pay would depend on how many doors they knocked.
The named plaintiffs were canvassers for Steel in October of this year, according to the suit, which alleges that they weren’t paid agreed-upon wages. America PAC is named because it provided campaigning services for Steel. wired.com/story/elon-mus…
These allegations are different from those WIRED reported earlier this week, when canvassers in Michigan said they were tricked and threatened as part of Elon Musk and America PAC’s get-out-the-vote effort for Donald Trump
NEW: Constitutional sheriffs are duly elected lawmen who believe they answer only to god. They've spent the last 6 months preparing to stop a "stolen" election.
It's a warning: 10 days out from the election, they'll do anything to make sure Trump wins. wired.com/story/constitu…
“Sheriffs are really beholden to nobody,” says Pelfrey. “Once elected, a sheriff has tremendous power, and there have been sheriffs who have been convicted and still hold office."
In nearly one in three US counties, sheriff departments are the largest law enforcement agency, meaning sheriff’s offices are the primary law enforcement agency for 56 million people. wired.com/story/constitu…
EXCLUSIVE: JD Vance's financial policy adviser Aaron Kofsky posted on Reddit for years about the use of cocaine, 'gas station heroin,' and other drugs.
Posts also show he instructed users on how to transport drugs through TSA.
Aaron Kofsky has for years posted extensively on Reddit about using a variety of drugs, including cocaine and opiates, under the username PsychoticMammal.
According to his LinkedIn, Kofsky has been advising JD Vance since this past May.
These drug-related posts have continued while Kofsky has been employed by the Senate. In May 2022, for example, PsychoticMammal responded to a post in the r/Cocaine subreddit, giving advice on how to smuggle drugs past airport security.
NEWS: A software update from cybersecurity company Crowdstrike appears to have inadvertently disrupted Microsoft IT systems globally. wired.trib.al/cvUpRaS
Banks, airports, TV stations, hotels, and countless other businesses are all facing widespread IT outages, leaving flights grounded and causing widespread disruption, after Windows machines have displayed errors worldwide. wired.com/story/microsof…
In the early hours of Friday, companies in Australia running Microsoft’s Windows operating system started reporting devices showing Blue Screens of Death (BSODs). wired.com/story/microsof…
NEW: J.D. Vance, a Republican US senator and Trump’s running mate left his Venmo account public, exposing his list of “friends,” from fellow Yale Law grads to tech executives—precisely the elites he rallies against. wired.com/story/jd-vance…
WIRED found that more than 200 people appear on Vance’s Venmo “friends” list. This includes Amalia Halikias, a director at the Heritage Foundation—the force behind Project 2025.
Vance’s Venmo friend’s list also includes media personalities like Bari Weiss and Tucker Carlson, as well as tech executives from Anthropic and AOL. wired.com/story/jd-vance…
SCOOP: Arab and Muslim workers at Meta allege that its response to the crisis in Gaza is one-sided and out of hand. “It makes me sick that I work for this company,” says one employee.
But when a club for Muslim workers revealed plans to spend $200 in company funds to serve nine dozen cupcakes in watermelon colors at the event, Meta management called the offering disruptive.