Silicon Valley Doesn't Get Why You Hate AI Technology leaders don't seem to understand society's gripes about AI, but boy, are they posting through it. Silicon Valley is trying to make sense of the growing backlash against artificial intelligence, but so far, it's not going that well. The inconvenient truth is that a significant portion of the world is not optimistic about the technology they're building. But recent attempts to diagnose the root of the problem by CEOs like Meta's Mark Zuckerberg and Anthropic's Dario Amodei indicate they don't understand what's actually driving society's disdain for AI. The rest of popular culture, meanwhile, is finding ways to capitalize on AI hate. Just look at this new commercial for Liquid Death and Garage Beer.

Tech Visionary Says the Big AI Labs Don't Get What People Want Tim O'Reilly built a publishing empire that AI is helping to destroy. Yet he loves AI--as long as it's open source. Tim O'Reilly's yardstick for measuring the worth of a company, person, or society has long been It's no surprise that O'Reilly-- publisher, internet pioneer, VC, conference organizer, and dispenser of tech wisdom --is applying that metric to the way people design and use AI. Specifically, he's pushing for a future where open-source AI is an elixir for the masses. He worries that, like Microsoft in the 1990s, today's hyperscalers are trying to lock users into their products.

AI is shifting the culture, from tech CEO manifestos to 1 am job interviews. Today on Brian Barrett, Zoë Schiffer, and Leah Feiger break down Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's 6,500-word AI manifesto and why it ultimately rings hollow. Plus, why are job seekers scheduling bot-run interviews at 1 am? WIRED's Andy Greenberg also joins to unpack the best findings from Black Hat and Defcon, from a hacked kids' smartwatch to a coin-sized device that can hijack a Boeing 737. McDonald's Built a 515-Page Dossier on Me. It Says I'll Never Stop Eating There Write to us at [email protected] . You can always listen to this week's podcast through the audio player on this page, but if you want to subscribe for free to get every episode, here's how: If you're on an iPhone or iPad, open the app called Podcasts, or just tap this link . I thought it was fun. The dialogue was kind of whatever, beautiful shots of the Sicilian ocean. And I went with my husband who loves to remind me that he studied Latin and Greek in high school, and he actually liked it too. I think everyone who is complaining about it needs to stop.

The Meta CEO has a new message now that his company is losing the AI race. At this stage in the AI race, if one of your chatbots hasn't escaped the lab and run amok, people start to wonder whether you're even serious. Last month, OpenAI and then Anthropic disclosed that their models had hacked other companies' systems during internal testing. When Meta confirmed last week that one of its bots had also gone rogue, the news barely registered as an aftershock. A company that figured so prominently in the technological upheavals of the past 20 years has lately found itself in the unfamiliar position of no longer being Silicon Valley's main character.

Plus: Nvidia has secured $500 billion from Wall Street for AI infrastructure. Nine years after Google researchers introduced the transformer, this family of neural networks has become the engine inside every major large language model. But transformers are starting to show their age. As LLMs get bigger and better, transformers have become a bottleneck. Their dense attention mechanism becomes increasingly expensive as the amount of text grows, and they're not great at keeping track of a lot of information at once. Here are four new ideas for how to solve the transformer problem --innovations that could change LLMs for good, making them faster, far more efficient, and (maybe) even smarter.

Twenty-six employees of Meta Platforms have filed a novel lawsuit accusing the tech giant of using AI-powered software that disproportionately targeted people with disabilities or who took medical leave in selecting workers for mass layoffs. The lawsuit, filed in Oakland, California, federal court late Monday, says that the company relied on factors such as productivity and AI token usage when it slashed thousands of jobs earlier this year, disadvantaging people who missed work because of medical conditions or to care for family members. The plaintiffs, who were notified in May that their jobs would be eliminated starting on July 22, are seeking a preliminary ruling from the court blocking Meta from completing the layoffs while they pursue their claims in private arbitration. The workers say Meta's agreements require employees to arbitrate workplace disputes individually, but do not apply to requests for temporary relief. A Meta spokesperson on Tuesday said the claims lack merit. "Workforce management and organizational decisions were and are made by people, not AI," the spokesperson said.

One of Meta's Offices Was Briefly Overtaken by a Rogue Squirrel The animal escaped after apparently arriving inside a package at Meta's Bangkok office, injuring one employee before finally being caught. Meta's year so far hasn't exactly been a picnic. A squirrel apparently got loose inside a building in Bangkok, Thailand, where some of the tech giant's regional teams are based. The critter spent at least 20 minutes darting past staff, according to an internal memo seen by WIRED. It noted that the squirrel minorly injured a janitor before finally being caught.

Amazon-owned MGM Studios' decision to drop the OpenAI movie is just part of AI and film industries becoming increasingly intertwined. On, we take a look at where this is all headed. This week on Uncanny Valley, our hosts discuss Amazon's controversial decision to drop Luca Guadagnino's film about OpenAI's Sam Altman--which reportedly did not paint him in a favorable light. Alongside Google DeepMind's $75 million brand new partnership with indie film studio A24, how much of a dent is AI actually having in the films we see? They also dive into the recent upheaval of workers--from electricians to software engineers--against data centers. Plus: Meta's program to track employees' data gets paused after a massive leak, and Anthropic is now getting along with the government thanks to CEO Dario Amodei no longer being in the room. Write to us at [email protected] . You can always listen to this week's podcast through the audio player on this page, but if you want to subscribe for free to get every episode, here's how: If you're on an iPhone or iPad, open the app called Podcasts, or just tap this link . Before we start, two quick things. If you've been enjoying listening to the show, we would appreciate it if you took a second to rate it in your podcast app of choice. It really helps us reach more people. And second, if you have any questions related to tech, privacy, or politics that you would like me, Zoë, and Leah to take on, now is the time to submit them to [email protected] . It doesn't matter how big or how small, we want to hear from you and get you answers. We're discussing Amazon's MGM Studios' sudden decision to drop the OpenAI biographical movie just as they were wrapping up production.

'Tell Him He's a Piece of Shit': Meta's New AI Unit Is a Total Mess Executives and employees alike are struggling with Meta's chaotic AI strategy, according to sources and internal discussions reviewed by WIRED. Someone interrupted a livestreamed, employee-only presentation at Meta earlier this week with an expletive-filled outburst about "being the company's bitch," according to a recording heard by WIRED. The individual then asked the people leading the call to write to a specific Meta AI executive and tell him that he's a piece of shit. One of the presenters covered their face with their hands, according to a witness. The incident, which took place on a call open to thousands of employees, reflects growing frustration inside the company's Applied AI team, which was formed in March to support the work of AI researchers at Meta Superintelligence Labs .

On the eve of about 8,000 jobs being cut, employees are cashing in on headphone stipends and other perks while they still can. Ahead of Meta's latest round of mass layoffs tomorrow, some employees are deserting offices, abandoning their work, and loading up on perks they might soon lose, several people at the company tell WIRED. Two employees describe a widespread rush to use up an annual $2,000 flexible benefit, which can cover a variety of expenses including health and wellness activities. A separate triennial credit of $200 toward the purchase of audio gear has led to a scramble to purchase Apple AirPods and other headphones. Another source says Meta offices have been largely empty this week, as people prioritize polishing their résumés and gather offsite to commiserate with friends for what may be their final time as colleagues.