To caution against the potential risks of artificial intelligence, five protesters took to the gates of a San Francisco home tied to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman earlier this week.
Altman and executives of other technology companies, speakers at the demonstration said, wield excessive power in the development of AI, technologies which perform tasks conventionally done by humans, such as driving.
Without responsible stewardship, speakers claimed AI could endanger public safety and jobs as human work is delegated to autonomous machines.
As passersby strolled Lombard Street to view its nearby hairpin turns, five demonstrators — three of which were speakers — pilloried OpenAI’s business practices and urged AI regulations and protections against job loss. The demonstration marks the first of more to come against technology executives outside the Russian Hill home, speaker and labor journalist Steve Zeltzer said.
According to a 2021 filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the home is tied to an individual named Sam Altman and Apollo Projects SPV-B.
Speakers called executives like Altman “technofascists” — profit-hungry individuals seeking to ward off regulation and retain control of AI without regard for its detriment to society.
“We have to say to Sam Altman and your cronies: We will be back,” Zeltzer said.
Before deploying AI models, engineers train them on data — images, videos, text or other information. For example, OpenAI’s ChatGPT, the automated chat service that rattles off responses to users’ questions, bases its responses on other pre-existing text.
To train its models, OpenAI said it uses publicly available and licensed data, according to its website. This practice, Zeltzer alleged, can amount to a form of “theft.”
He noted recent concerns around OpenAI’s development of Sky, an AI-powered voice that many likened to that of Scarlett Johansson.
“People in San Francisco, people in this country want accountability, and they don’t want robber barons,” said Zeltzer.
In a statement released in May, Altman apologized to Johansson. He also said Sky was not intended to resemble her but rather based on the voice of a paid actor. The company statement, nevertheless, said OpenAI paused its use of Sky.
Zeltzer warned that further AI development would rely on content from writers, artists and actors without their permission. He said technology companies should compensate those whose work they use to train AI.
Exposing ethical and safety concerns
Another speaker and activist against self-driving cars, Howard Williams sowed doubt in the efficacy of some AI, taking aim at Waymo, whose fleets of autonomous vehicles pace the streets of San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix and Austin, the company says.
Williams listed Google AI scandals — including one where the company’s Gemini chat service produced illustrations of people of color in German military gear from the World War II era. Google and Waymo are separate subsidiaries of the same parent company, Alphabet Inc.
“Some people seem to be OK with that kind of AI running their cars, being their chauffeur instead of a human being,” Williams said. “You imagine if the human being was your chauffeur, and you knew these things about that human being, that person would probably be fired.”
After Williams’ speech, Zeltzer cited when a car operated by the autonomous taxi company Cruise ran over and pinned a woman along the pavement in San Francisco last October. Three weeks later, the California Department of Motor Vehicles suspended Cruise’s driverless cars from the city’s streets.
Speakers also warned of the potential for worker displacement and urged regulations to protect jobs.
Zeltzer pointed to a report from last year by investment giant Goldman Sachs that claimed AI could automate up to one-quarter of work in the U.S. and 300 million jobs worldwide.
People in San Francisco, people in this country want accountability, and they don’t want robber barons.
Steve Zeltzer, speaker and labor journalist
Before technology companies deploy AI technologies, Zeltzer suggested research be released detailing how they may affect workers and the public. He also urged implementing protections for those who may lose their jobs to autonomous agents.
Edward Escobar, the third speaker at Monday’s event and founder of Alliance for Independent Workers, suggested turning technology companies into worker-owned cooperatives. The cooperants, he said, could advocate for protections in the event AI replaces their jobs.
“We have to look at sustainability factors, and what’s going to happen with the future of work,” Escobar said. “These are big questions, but we can start addressing them bit by bit.”
Zeltzer said the demonstration was organized by a group of organizations, including the Alliance for Independent Workers and the United Front Committee for a Labor Party. He added future demonstrations by Altman’s home will come as soon as next month but did not specify a date.
OpenAI and Altman did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
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