The Download: OpenAI’s caste bias problem, and how AI videos are made
Plus: Taiwan has pushed back against America’s chip request
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.
OpenAI is huge in India. Its models are steeped in caste bias.
Caste bias is rampant in OpenAI’s products, including ChatGPT, according to an MIT Technology Review investigation. Though CEO Sam Altman boasted about India being its second-largest market during the launch of GPT-5 in August, we found that both this new model, which now powers ChatGPT, as well as Sora, OpenAI’s text-to-video generator, exhibit caste bias. This risks entrenching discriminatory views in ways that are currently going unaddressed.
Mitigating caste bias in AI models is more pressing than ever. In contemporary India, many caste-oppressed Dalit people have escaped poverty and have become doctors, civil service officers, and scholars; some have even risen to become the president of India. But AI models continue to reproduce socioeconomic and occupational stereotypes that render Dalits as dirty, poor, and performing only menial jobs. Read the full story.
—Nilesh Christopher
MIT Technology Review Narrated: how do AI models generate videos?
It’s been a big year for video generation. The downside is that creators are competing with AI slop, and social media feeds are filling up with faked news footage. Video generation also uses up a huge amount of energy, many times more than text or image generation.
With AI-generated videos everywhere, let’s take a moment to talk about the tech that makes them work.
This is our latest story to be turned into a MIT Technology Review Narrated podcast, which we’re publishing each week on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Just navigate to MIT Technology Review Narrated on either platform, and follow us to get all our new content as it’s released.
The must-reads
I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.
1 Taiwan has rejected America’s chip demand
It’s pushed back on a US request to move 50% of chip production to the States. (Bloomberg $)
+ Taiwan said it never agreed to the commitment. (CNN)
+ Taiwan’s “silicon shield” could be weakening. (MIT Technology Review)
2 Chatbots may not be eliminating jobs after all
A new labor market study has found little evidence they’re putting humans out of work. (FT $)
+ People are worried that AI will take everyone’s jobs. We’ve been here before. (MIT Technology Review)
3 OpenAI has released a new Sora video app
It’s the latest in a long line of attempts to make AI a social experience. (Axios)
+ Copyright holders will have to request the removal of their property. (WSJ $)
4 Scientists have made embryos from human skin cells for the first time
It could allow people experiencing infertility and same-sex couples to have children. (BBC)
+ How robots are changing the face of fertility science. (WP $)
5 Elon Musk claims to be building a Wikipedia rival
Which I’m sure will be entirely accurate and impartial. (Gizmodo)
+ How AI and Wikipedia have sent vulnerable languages into a doom spiral. (MIT Technology Review)
6 America’s chips resurgence has been thrown into chaos
After funding was yanked from the multi-billion dollar initiative designed to revive the industry. (Politico)
7 ICE wants to buy a phone location-tracking tool
Even though it doesn’t have a warrant to do so. (404 Media)
8 The trouble with scaling up EV manufacturing
Solid-state batteries are the holy grail—but is full commercialization feasible? (Knowable Magazine)
+ Why bigger EVs aren’t always better. (MIT Technology Review)
9 DoorDash’s food delivery robot is coming to Arizona’s roads
Others before it have failed. Can Dot succeed? (TechCrunch)
10 What it’s like to give ChatGPT therapy
It’s very good at telling you what it thinks you want to hear. (New Yorker $)
+ Therapists are secretly using ChatGPT. Clients are triggered. (MIT Technology Review)
Quote of the day
“Please treat adults like adults.”
—An X user reacts angrily to OpenAI’s moves to restrict the topics ChatGPT will discuss, Ars Technica reports.
One more thing
Africa fights rising hunger by looking to foods of the past
After falling steadily for decades, the prevalence of global hunger is now on the rise—nowhere more so than in sub-Saharan Africa, thanks to conflicts, economic fallout from the covid-19 pandemic, and extreme weather events.
Africa’s indigenous crops are often more nutritious and better suited to the hot and dry conditions that are becoming more prevalent, yet many have been neglected by science, which means they tend to be more vulnerable to diseases and pests and yield well below their theoretical potential.
Now the question is whether researchers, governments, and farmers can work together in a way that gets these crops onto plates and provides Africans from all walks of life with the energy and nutrition that they need to thrive, whatever climate change throws their way. Read the full story.
—Jonathan W. Rosen
We can still have nice things
A place for comfort, fun and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or skeet ’em at me.)
+ The mighty Stonehenge is still keeping us guessing after all these years (4,600 of them).
+ Björk’s VR experience looks typically bonkers.
+ We may finally have an explanation for the will-o’-the-wisp phenomenon.
+ How to build your very own Commodore 64 Cartridge.
