Blog #10 In the Age of AI reaction

After Watching the Age of AI video, it has definitely made me think a lot about how much access AI has to my personal life and social media accounts that I use daily. Technology has helped advance so much and it has changed the world so much that it has become a part of our norms in society.

I think this part was really important to me in the video when they mentioned the match that happened in 2016 South Korea between an AI robot and a professional go player. It was a program created by Google and it is an AI simulation of a popular game named Go.

The purpose of this match was to see how advanced technology can be and how it can learn more from humans. Another reason that scared me a bit was technology imitating human behavior and even making us learn from their moves. The AI robot won against the human, and it started a trend of the froth of technology being used in everyday life.

I think my main takeaway was when the author was being interviewed on the video and she said that “we think we are using technology when technology is using us” I learned about how tech companies have a lot of data and information on their user more than I thought. Especially when they used the examples of Google and Amazon. 

Google was a tech company that advanced people’s access to information and knowledge. The founders made lots of money, but investors wanted more money and kept competitors away. So, Google started saving user search history and even started making their own search engine based on predictions or popular search in order to make users use their platform more. It was spine- chilling to find that out because I thought it was to help people not to spy on them. 

Then the Amazon Alexa is used to analyze human behavior and develop data on their users in order to provide better users to keep their business running. I think that these instances are a huge invasion of privacy because most people do not know that they are being stalked by these devices. 

It is upsetting to hear that it wasn’t until a man from California proposed a bill in order to help people protect their privacy. I think that is a national security issue as well because it is easy for hackers or people with bad intentions to access this information. For example, Mark Zuckerberg was fined for selling his users data without user's consent in Europe. That is huge and just imagine what else social media promotes to people, especially young children. 

My personal experience after watching the video was more awareness about apps and my devices because I wanted my privacy and did not feel comfortable with someone having my personal data. Technology can have benefits like providing knowledge and creativity, but it can all be used against you. Overall, technology is not a bad thing but there should definitely be some regulation on companies and how much power they have over data.