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**Disclaimer: I work in AI. This article is not meant to be fear mongering, but an acknowledgement of the potential dangers of AI. Read to the end. Additionally, this article is highly opinionated and speculative and may not accurately represent the facts. It’s based on my professional opinion and experience. This is my first draft. I’m seeking advice on the general concepts, but hope to make the article more grounded in rigorous research after initial feedback.**
The rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and the ever-growing abundance of user data are set to revolutionize the advertising industry. As AI becomes more sophisticated, particularly in the realm of natural language processing (NLP), businesses will gain an unprecedented ability to target and influence consumer behavior through personalized advertising. This development poses a fundamental issue: while adding value to an economy becomes increasingly expensive as it develops, influencing consumers does not. I argue this imbalance will lead to a divergence between the interests of consumers and corporations.
As economies grow and develop, it becomes more challenging for businesses to provide additional value to consumers. This is due to several key economic principles. Firstly, the idea of diminishing returns suggests that as companies invest more resources, like money and labor, into their products or services, the added value for each additional unit of investment gets smaller over time. Secondly, as markets mature, there is often more competition, making it harder for companies to stand out and offer something unique to consumers. Lastly, in more advanced economies, there is often a shift from manufacturing to service industries, where the value provided to consumers can be less clear-cut and harder to measure compared to physical products. While there are always exceptions and chances for businesses to innovate, these factors contribute to the general trend of increasing difficulty in providing added value as economies develop. Alternatively, corporations can raise their bottom line by instead of offering utility, influencing consumer behaviors. As an economy, research and technology develop, influencing consumers becomes easier and more cost effective.
Historically, companies have been limited in their ability to influence consumers due to a lack of resources to interact with each user individually. Instead, they relied on making rough generalizations about most of their users. While companies have learned to capitalize on phycology of the brain, they have been limited in their ability to personalize to users and affect targeted change in behavior. However, over the past few years, companies have acquired a significant amount of data on their individual users, especially natural language data, even though they may not yet have the technology to fully utilize it. For example, Google stores far more user data than they can currently process. The reason for this is that the incorporation of NLP and intelligent AI provides a novel opportunity. Companies will be able to tap into the vast amounts of data users have generated over the past decades, using it to build human behavioral models that will continuously learn and develop.
The combination of powerful AI algorithms and vast troves of user data will enable businesses to create highly targeted and persuasive content. By analyzing patterns in consumer behavior, preferences, and interactions, AI systems will be able to predict which content is most likely to resonate with individual users. As companies grow their data troves, AI technology, and capital, tech companies could exponentially gain influence over human behavior, especially in purchasing products.
We have already seen this start to occur in companies like TikTok, where they have been able to optimize user content, so effectively that Americans spend hours a day on their application. While TikTok benefits from this increased user engagement, users themselves may not necessarily benefit from spending hours a day on their phones. Companies also have the ability to profit from advertisements that don’t necessarily benefit the user. Whether it’s medical companies pushing drugs like opiates, dating apps encouraging you to hook-up with strangers, or political campaigns persuading you to elect their candidate, the interests of the user and companies have become increasingly divergent.
As this trend continues, companies that incorporate these AI technologies into their advertising products will likely outcompete those that do not. Over three to four years, I would argue that the threat of my hypothesis is relatively low. However, in 10-15 years when AI may in many ways be more intelligent than humans the threat of my hypothesis is existential. What happens when a highly intelligent system controls your media and influences your behavior with the sole intention of generating profit for corporations with interest that might not be aligned with your own?
I don’t mean to be a fear monger. There is a purpose to this article. How do we solve this issue? I think there are two possible ways in which our society avoids the fate I hypothesize about.
The first being government intervention. The government needs to protect the interest of consumers. When companies in the 19th century became incredibly powerful, the government had to step in to protect the rights of the employee. In order to protect the rights, well being and freedom of users similar interventions must be instituted. However, I don’t think the government will implement such changes because they benefit from the mass collection of data and receive sponsorship from large corporations like Google and Microsoft.
In fact, the government and the associated political parties could pose a larger threat than any singular corporation. They collect more personal information than any corporation and have the most to gain from utilizing it. The government collects all text, calls, and all data they can get their hands on from US citizens as part of the patriot act. Additionally, As we’ve seen during the 2018 election the influence of political digital advertising and bots pose an existential threat to our democracy. The data and ability to utilize are undeniable. Politicians and parties who utilize AI unethically to gain power will imagemate power while those who don’t will lose out, potentially forcing out more ethical competition. It is essential that we ensure that the political candidates do not use AI and user data for personal gain. In order to assure the security of our democracy, the change must be aided by individuals through means of political action and discourse.
Some reasonable guidelines for the collection of user data and artificial intelligence might be:
Eliminating unpermitted data collection and storage: If companies do not have data, they are limited in their ability to build individual and adaptive systems that can influence human behavior
Transparency on AI usage: While how future AI will function is unknown, understanding how it works and what the objective of the AI are will allow individuals to better navigate and respond to the use of AI.
AI guidelines: As AI develops, a set of legal guidelines must be established to prevent the usage of unethical AI.
Secondly, the influence of AI on media could be far less than I project. Perhaps, there are limitations on how effective add personalization can get. No matter what someone sees on their phone, it might not be able to convince them or influence their behavior. For example, digital media may not be able to change our core values or beliefs.
I acknowledge that there will certainly be a ceiling on the effects of AI personalized media, but what are those ceilings? While AI may not be able to change the behavior of everyone, I think it will be able to have a small effect on a select group of people. However, having the ability to affect a select few people can swing an election, can start a revolution or change the world in any number of ways. It’s difficult to predict the influence that AI could have on society, but I speculate that it will be significant. While the article has highlighted potential dangers of AI, the goal is not to argue that AI is bad.
AI possesses an immense capacity to shape our society and influence human behavior. The key is ensuring that the goals of AI align with the interest of the individuals that make up our society. By keeping in check the powerful entities that influence our society and equipping consumers with the power of AI, I believe the technology will have an overwhelmingly positive impact on society.
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