Leading computer scientist and co-founder of Black in A.I, Dr Timnit Gebru, was hired by Google to co-lead its Ethical AI team with another tech industry trailblazer Dr Margaret Mitchell.

The team investigated the ethics of artificial intelligence to understand and prevent its potential harms.

Timnit was the first Black woman the company had employed in a research scientist role.

Then Google terminated her contract sparking an international outcry.

Some 7000 industry colleagues and others, including thousands within Google itself, signed a petition protesting her departure.

Then Dr Margaret Mitchell was fired too.

Now Timnit is driving "community-rooted" artificial intelligence research free from what she describes as "Big Tech's pervasive influence".

For RN Summer we're playing some our favourite programs from the past year. This program was first broadcast in April 2022.

Guest:

Dr Timnit Gebru@TimnitGebruComputer scientist and engineerFounder of the Distributed A.I Research Institute (DAIR)Co-founder, Black in A.I

Further info:

The Algorithmic Justice League

Coded Bias (documentary film)

Data in Society

Gender Shades: Intersectional Accuracy Disparities in Commercial Gender Classification (Buolamwini, Gebru; 2018)

Timnit Gebru's publications (Google Scholar)

Petition in support of Dr Timnit Gebru

Why Timnit Gebru Isn’t Waiting for Big Tech to Fix AI's Problems (Time, 2022)

Timnit Gebru is building a slow AI movement (IEEE Spectrum, 2022)

On the Dangers of Stochastic Parrots: Can Language Models Be Too Big? (Bender, Gebru, McMillan-Major, Mitchell; 2021)

AI at Google (Sundar Pichai, 2018)

"The withering email that got an ethical AI researcher fired at Google" (Platformer, 2020)

"We read the paper that forced Timnit Gebru out of Google. Here's what it says" (MIT Technology Review, 2020)

"Inside Timnit Gebru's last days at Google - and what happens next" (MIT Technology Review, 2020)

Google fires top AI ethics researcher Margaret Mitchell

On racialised tech organisations and complaint - a goodbye to Google (Alex Hanna, 2022)

Constructing a Visual Dataset to Study the Effects of Spatial Apartheid in South Africa (Sefala, Gebru, Mfupe, Moorosi, 2021)

The In/justices of AI (Science Friction, ABC RN, 2020)

Chatbot mania and algorithms of oppression (Science Friction, ABC RN, 2017)