[23758] in Privacy_Forum
[ PRIVACY Forum ] Script of my national radio report yesterday on
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Lauren Weinstein)
Tue Jun 9 10:54:01 2026
Date: Tue, 9 Jun 2026 07:44:16 -0700
From: Lauren Weinstein <lauren@vortex.com>
To: privacy-dist@vortex.com
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This is the script of my national network radio report yesterday on
users abandoning Google services due to concerns about their AI
policies. It also includes discussion of related AI issues. As always,
there may have been minor wording variations from this script as I
presented this report live on air.
- - -
Yeah, this is quite interesting and though it would be unwise to read
too much into it at this point this seems to be yet another aspect of
pushback against AI as firms like Google increasingly attempt to force
users to use their Large Language Model generative AI systems whether
those users want to or not. As Google has pushed more AI Overview
results into searches and now has confusingly modified their main
search page to try funnel users into their Gemini AI conversations --
where misinformation is rampant -- there are reports that significant
numbers of Google users are moving to other platforms. These can be
search engines that either don't have AI aspects or at least make it
straightforward for users to avoid their search results being poisoned
by AI hallucinations and other AI Slop.
One of the claims you'll frequently hear from LLM generative AI
boosters and their various political supporters of those massive,
grotesque, AI data centers is that if you stand in their way you will
block progress toward new cancer cures and other medical breakthroughs
and the like. But that's a smokescreen. The vast amount of this data
center capacity is aimed not at machine learning types of AI useful
for medical, weather, and other so-called Big Data analysis. Rather,
the many hundreds of billions of dollars being spent on these data
centers and related efforts to force their systems down users' throats
are almost entirely about Large Language Model generative AI SLOP.
We're talking slop applications like creating sexualized and other
deep fakes, automated phishing scams, misinformation-filled search
query answers that starve source sites of views, agentic AI -- which I
recommend you never use -- that can destroy your data and empty your
wallet while the AI firms take no responsibility, AI chatbots that
have reportedly urged users toward murder and suicide, cheating
machines for kids in school, vibe coding systems that generate garbage
code and create an excuse for mass tech layoffs -- and so on.
That's the reality of Big Tech LLM AI, and is what these horrific data
centers tearing apart rural and other communities are mostly all
about. Despite many politicians in both parties seemingly willing to
cheerfully agree to whatever the Big Tech CEOs who control these AI
firms want to do, the pushback from many communities and users -- in
rural, urban, and suburban areas, is significant and rapidly growing.
It is important though to realize that we are really only at the
beginning of these battles. For example, despite the impressive
percentage increases in users we've seen at some Google competitors
lately, in absolute terms these are still relatively low numbers and
Google not only controls the vast majority of searches but is likely
to continue doing so for the foreseeable future. Switching search and
in particular affiliated services to another company -- like browsers,
email, and more, can be a tough lift even for many tech-savvy users.
So simply suggesting that users switch services probably isn't the
best approach -- changes need to be required for services like
Google's and those from the other giant AI firms, changes that will
better serve society, not just those firms' bottom lines.
AI data centers can be environmental disasters for otherwise
beautiful, unspoiled rural areas. The percentage of students found to
be cheating using AI has reportedly gone through the roof and
professors are giving out more F grades as a result. AI misinformation
is contaminating fact-based knowledge causing ever more confusion and
damage. Google just announced privacy policy changes seemingly
designed to use even more of your personal data for training Google AI
without your giving them any specific new permission to do so.
The EU will reportedly be requiring Google to give users and sites
ways to opt-out of some AI aspects, but it's unclear if the U.S. will
ever get the same controls, or how effective they'd actually be and
what the consequences of using them would be.
It's all frankly an enormous mess in ways that we've never before seen
in the history of technology, beginning with those first stone knives
of our ancient ancestors long ago. The Big Tech CEOs seem to feel that
they own us, and again there seem to be politicians in both parties
who are more than happy to endorse that view. The ultimate
responsibility is of course our own. We can elect politicians who
could -- if they so choose -- pass the kinds of laws and regulations
that are already desperately needed to reign in AI abuses, and are
becoming more crucial and necessary every day. If we fail to elect
politicians who will actually do this, then that's on us, and those
billionaire CEOs will indeed be gleefully chuckling at our expense,
watching as WE all get the proverbial AI shaft.
- - -
L
- - -
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren@vortex.com (https://www.vortex.com/lauren)
Lauren's Blog: https://lauren.vortex.com
Mastodon: https://mastodon.laurenweinstein.org/@lauren
Signal: By request on need to know basis
Founder: Network Neutrality Squad: https://www.nnsquad.org
PRIVACY Forum: https://www.vortex.com/privacy-info
Co-Founder: People For Internet Responsibility
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