The AIs Are Not Taking Our Jobs...They Are Changing Them

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The AIs Are Not Taking Our Jobs

Tim O’ReillyThe Web Summit

November 6, 2014

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They Are Changing Them

Tim O’ReillyThe Web Summit

November 6, 2014

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Some other scary AI taking our jobs...or maybe Kevin Kelly?

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Human-Computer Symbiosis

“The hope is that, in not too many years, human brains and computing machines will be coupled together very tightly, and that the resulting

partnership will think as no human brain has ever thought and process data in a way not approached by the information-handling machines we

know today.”

Licklider, J.C.R., "Man-Computer Symbiosis", IRE Transactions on Human Factors in Electronics, vol. HFE-1, 4-11, Mar 1960. Eprint

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We are building a global brain

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The Internet of Things and Humans

#IoTH

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and it is giving us super-powers

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Our Phones Used to Be the Tool of Superheroes

Dick Tracy: 1946 Star Trek: 1964

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A Modern Superpower

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Now, I want you to notice something.

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The Google Self-Driving Car

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The recorded memory of augmented humans

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Imagine Google Glass Reinventing Personalized Home Health Care

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Uber too is a Human-Machine Symbiosis

Only possible because both driver and passengers carry GPS-enabled cellphones

Big data back end does dispatch, tracks distance and time traveled, automates billing, tracks reputation

But people are the “last mile”

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With an AI as Dispatcher Drivers are available in locations that never had taxis Drivers are available at more times, because supply is matched

to demand Drivers can work when they want, for how long they want Reputation systems rather than licensing bring new supply into

the market

Location and worker arbitrage increasing supply is also a key element in other sharing economy companies

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Uber is a Human-Machine Symbiosis

People + new kinds of smart machines = the ability to rethink an entire industry

We’re no longer just building software, we’re building new business processes and workflows in the real world

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“Uber is a $3.5 billion lesson in building for how the world *should* work instead of

optimizing for how the world *does* work” - Aaron Levie of

Box.net

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Work not jobs!

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So when someone says to you that technology is taking away jobs

... remind them how much still needs doing, and how much technology can be a tool for tackling the world’s biggest problems!

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Work on stuff that matters!

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Work that needs doing Taking care of an aging population Feeding the world Improving health Teaching and caring for children Rebuilding our infrastructure Energy and water conservation New sources of carbon-free energy Rebuilding trust in government Encouraging people to dream of a better future!

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Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

“Think of Maslow’s famous pyramid of needs. At the bottom you’ve got material needs, as you climb up towards self actualization, meaning,

friendship, connection etc. I would simply say that more of the economy needs to go further up Maslow’s pyramid. I think that’s happening anyway — the fact that Facebook’s now one of the most important companies in

the world. I don’t think it’s doing it that well, but it’s further up the tree than an oil company. It’s further up the pyramid of needs.”

- Alain de Botton

http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/02/alain-de-bottons-better-capitalism/

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Siri Autism BFF

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“One easy way to forecast the future is to predict that what rich people have now, middle class people will have in five years, and poor people will have in ten years. It worked for radio, TV, dishwashers, mobile phones, flat screen TV, and many other pieces of technology.

“What do rich people have now? Chauffeurs? In a few more years, we’ll all have access to driverless cars. Maids? We will soon be able to get housecleaning robots. Personal assistants? That’s Google Now.”http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~hal/Papers/2013/BeyondBigDataPaperFINAL.pdf

Hal Varian

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Donor’s Choose Stats

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“…one privilege the insured and well-off have is to excuse the terrible quality of services the government routinely delivers to the poor. Too often, the press ignores — or simply never knows — the pain and trouble of interfacing with government bureaucracies that the poor struggle with daily.”

— Ezra Klein

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“User needs. An empathetic service would ground itself in the concrete needs of concrete

people. It’s not about innovation, big data, government-as-a-platform, transparency,

crowd-funding, open data, or civic tech. It’s about people. Learning to prioritize people

and their needs will be a long slog. It’s the kind of change that happens slowly, one person

at a time. But we should start.”

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GDS

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Government can work

for the people,

by the people,

in the 21st century,

if we make it so.

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for the people

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for people

by people

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We can build services

for people,

by people,

of people

in the 21st century,