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Google AI

How Google's 'Don't Be Evil' Motto Has Evolved For the AI Age (cbsnews.com) 53

Posted by BeauHD from the safety-first dept.
In a special report for CBS News' 60 Minutes, Google CEO Sundar Pichai shares his concerns about artificial intelligence and why the company is choosing to not release advanced models of its AI chatbot. From the report: When Google filed for its initial public offering in 2004, its founders wrote that the company's guiding principle, "Don't be evil" was meant to help ensure it did good things for the world, even if it had to forgo some short term gains. The phrase remains in Google's code of conduct. Pichai told 60 Minutes he is being responsible by not releasing advanced models of Bard, in part, so society can get acclimated to the technology, and the company can develop further safety layers.

One of the things Pichai told 60 Minutes that keeps him up at night is Google's AI technology being deployed in harmful ways. Google's chatbot, Bard, has built in safety filters to help combat the threat of malevolent users. Pichai said the company will need to constantly update the system's algorithms to combat disinformation campaigns and detect deepfakes, computer generated images that appear to be real. As Pichai noted in his 60 Minutes interview, consumer AI technology is in its infancy. He believes now is the right time for governments to get involved.

"There has to be regulation. You're going to need laws ... there have to be consequences for creating deep fake videos which cause harm to society," Pichai said. "Anybody who has worked with AI for a while ... realize[s] this is something so different and so deep that, we would need societal regulations to think about how to adapt." Adaptation that is already happening around us with technology that Pichai believes, "will be more capable "anything we've ever seen before." Soon it will be up to society to decide how it's used and whether to abide by Alphabet's code of conduct and, "Do the right thing."
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How Google's 'Don't Be Evil' Motto Has Evolved For the AI Age More

How Google's 'Don't Be Evil' Motto Has Evolved For the AI Age

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  • Donâ(TM)t be evil uh? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SlashingAllTheDots ( 10301705 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @06:09PM (#63457480)
    I think lying is pretty evil?

    Google misjudged how quickly and popular AI models were to be, and are now playing it off as if they are holding back on purpose: I call bullshit.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sd4f ( 1891894 )

      I think it's more a case of their tech is probably not "good enough" to compete, so they're just on a campaign to pooh-pooh their competitor.

      I think the issue in general is that this happened really suddenly, and google have been really caught off guard with this. It's not like as if AI competes against some marginal product line on the periphery of google's products; microsoft is going straight for the jugular by integrating it into bing as it's directly targeting Google's crown jewel in 'search'.

      • Yup. Google's "don't be evil" has always had a secret rider to it, "unless it affects the bottom line". This is just them turning a bug, lack of a competitive AI, into a "feature" for marketing purposes.

        • I don't know - early on when they were a young upstart they seemed to mean it. Once they became a major corporation... well, the joke has long been that the actual motto is "Don't. Be evil."

          In fact, didn't they actually abandon the motto like a decade ago?

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by HiThere ( 15173 )

            It was never their actual motto. IIRC there was a division or department that had it as a motto, but not the company. But, yeah, to the extent that it was ever "official" it was retracted LONG ago.

    • People used to walk their dogs. Now they walk their iphones. And Slashot looks more and more like the sidewalk. :-(

  • "don't be evil" didn't evolve... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Rujiel ( 1632063 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @06:09PM (#63457484)
    ..it died a long time ago, if it ever was a thing at all. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/0... [nytimes.com]

  • So in other words... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SoCalChris ( 573049 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @06:15PM (#63457500) Journal

    This is a great excuse to tell the public as to why they haven't released something better than Chat GPT's without admitting that they're way behind the curve.

    "We totally have something better, we just don't want to release it, the world isn't ready for it yet!"

    See also, "My girlfriend is Canadian, you wouldn't know her."

  • Do five seconds of preliminary research, CBS (Score:5, Informative)

    by CrappySnackPlane ( 7852536 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @06:25PM (#63457534)

    From TFS:

    When Google filed for its initial public offering in 2004, its founders wrote that the company's guiding principle, "Don't be evil" was meant to help ensure it did good things for the world, even if it had to forgo some short term gains. The phrase remains in Google's code of conduct.

    Once again, a news outlet lets the subject of the so-called "news" define the terms. Dig a little bit deeper [gizmodo.com] (i.e., literally just click the first Google link for "Google 'don't be evil'"), and we find:

    Google’s unofficial motto has long been the simple phrase “don’t be evil.” But that’s over, according to the code of conduct that Google distributes to its employees. The phrase was removed sometime in late April or early May, archives hosted by the Wayback Machine show

    [ . . . ]

    The updated version of Google’s code of conduct still retains one reference to the company’s unofficial motto—the final line of the document is still: “And remember don’t be evil, and if you see something that you think isn’t right – speak up!”

    That's hardly the placement of a "guiding principle". The updated placement is more of an afterthought, a wrap-up after a bunch of equivocating wishy-washy gibberish that's basically a copy-paste from every other company's standard code of conduct.

    But all we, the reader, get is an unqualified, uninquisitive "the phrase remains in Google's code of conduct".

  • "Don't Be Evil" was replaced by... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rnturn ( 11092 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @06:26PM (#63457538)

    ... "Bwahahaha!" a long time ago.

  • In other words, (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Yxven ( 1100075 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @06:27PM (#63457542)

    Pichai admits Google's AI isn't competitive. He hopes that his new found competition gets regulated to death, and he is doing his part to make sure that happens.

  • It changed long ago (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Sure it used to be "Don't be evil." But the last decade has proven it to be "Don't get caught being evil."
  • Google is directly complicit in performing intentionally malicious psychological experiments on (some non-zero subset of) USA-based end users, on USA-soil. Which billionaire was (redacted) talking about, re: (redacted) lessons in (redacted) with whom I had the falling out due to (redacted)?

    The Justice Dept may have uncovered antitrust issues and possible destruction of evidence, but from my point of view, these clowns are directly responsible for unchecked and unaccountable data abuse, with zero liabilit
    • And a bloody idiot: he's turned the company into a target for contempt, up there with Microsoft. And for what? Would they have made far fewer billions a year had they stuck to "Don't Be Evil"?

  • That's a shame (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jenningsthecat ( 1525947 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @07:18PM (#63457658)

    It's been quite a while since I watched 60 Minutes. I recall that it was usually hard-hitting, but the description here makes this segment sound like a puff piece.

    Then again, I suspect that any time Pichai puts himself on public display, a puff piece is the desired outcome. Anything that makes him seem humane, ("keeps him up at night"), or thoughtful, ("this is something so different and so deep that, we would need societal regulations to think about how to adapt"), is probably just strategic posturing.

  • I would assume all AI would devolve (evolve?) into evil so apparently theirs isn't working proper and we need to give it time.

  • Don't be evil... LoL... (Score:3)

    by Kelxin ( 3417093 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @08:05PM (#63457712)
    The GPS on the pixel 6a is downright evil and they won't do anything about it.

  • New Motto (Score:4, Funny)

    by TwistedGreen ( 80055 ) on Monday April 17, 2023 @08:33PM (#63457740)

    The motto is now "Be Evil."

  • Googol's Motto (Score:5, Funny)

    by kenwd0elq ( 985465 ) <kenwd0elq@engineer.com> on Monday April 17, 2023 @08:47PM (#63457762)

    Googol's motto used to be "Don't be evil". Since then, the motto hasn't changed so much as it has bee re-punctuated.

    It is now "Don't! Be evil!"

  • The new mission statement.

  • Found myself wanting to punch Pichai throughout the entirety of the interview.

    Why did they even interview Google in the first place? If anything should have been talking to OpenAI.

    Second half should have been /w experts with different perspectives instead of the entirety being the thoughts of huge corporations with skin in the game.

  • If there was ever an example of something aging like milk, a corporation claiming it won't be evil would be it.

  • Google was caught with their pants down (Score:3)

    by wakeboarder ( 2695839 ) on Tuesday April 18, 2023 @12:24AM (#63457986)
    They have the resources to do AI like this, but for whatever reason they haven't improved their search. Maybe it's because they get paid no matter what in the near term. What a better excuse to say that you are withholding AI for moral reasons than because it isn't working, but I assure you, no company making billions of dollars makes decisions for moral reasons. The weird thing is they are asking for regulation, which probably means, we like the staus quo. That kind of attitude will get you playing second fiddle in the market eventually
  • Google is scared shitless they fell asleep at the wheel and people will start using other search engines which have better AI models. After all, it's easy enough to switch search engines, even if Google plays billions to be the default one on some devices. Being a better search engine is how Google took over as the leader, from Yahoo, Altavista and a number of others. I personally know people who have only recently started using Edge purely because Microsoft ChatGPT is a better search engine.

    Google has on
  • Apparently just like entropy can only increase in isolated systems, laws only increase. Of course the proponents of expanded laws always have good reasons - harm to children and the end of civilization as we know being the most common. Recall the scary FBI trailers at the start of movies that warned of economic catastrophes caused by copying videos. I live in LA and the video industry is booming because of the demand for internet content which is readily copied.

  • And fully embrace "BE EVIL!"

  • With "all results must include ads".

  • For any values of $Evil >0.99
  • There's no actual, rational reason to have removed it even if they were most forms of evil. You have to be the special kind of evil to make a public display of removing a famous symbol of virtue rather than simply being hypocrites like a normal business.
  • Search algorithms were Google's main success story. But the company has long departed from the "Do no evil" motto to "Do harm if somebody pays enough." Google helps the Chinese Communist Party control their people and round up Uyghurs to be used for body parts. They also will not help the US military for any purpose, but helping the Chinese military is another matter since the Chinese military is the Chinese government and controls much of the businesses in China.

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