

These companies exert a lot of influence and power over their fields since AI underpins some of their popular products like Google search engine and Amazon’s Alexa. Researchers like Gebru have been speaking about freeing AI research from the clutches of big tech. It will mark DAIR’s debut in the academic AI research circle at the NeurIPS conference.

DAIR will soon be publishing a paper on this project. A preliminary analysis showed that most vacant land in the densely populated region that was once restricted to non-white and poor people, developed between 20, has now been converted to wealthy residential areas.

One of the first projects that the institute will work on is creating a public dataset of aerial imagery of South Africa to examine how and if apartheid is still etched into land use. DAIR eventually plans to establish itself as a non-profit organisation.ĭAIR will develop use cases for AI that are unlikely to be developed anywhere else (read big tech companies) to further inspire others to give technology a new direction. This will ultimately build the movement towards an inclusive and equitable technology. With DAIR, investors and founders hope to build a field of public interest technology – meaning harnessing the power of emerging technologies for the public good. MacArthur Foundation, the Kapor Center and the Open Society Foundation, among others.
Timnit gebru dair code#
The new institute established by Gebru is currently a Code for Science and Society project and has received $3 million in funding from Ford Foundation, the John D. Yes to new research paradigms! Yes to epic collaborations. I love the poetic Justice of my dear friend launching a year after her unconscionable firing. When AI research, development and deployment is rooted in people and communities from the start, we can get in front of these harms and create a future that values equity and humanity,” said Gebru. It has been elevated to a superhuman level, which leads us to believe it is inevitable and beyond our control. “AI needs to be brought back down to earth. Last year, Gebru, who then worked as the co-lead of the Ethics AI team, was ousted from Google for allegedly co-authoring a paper on large language models and their adverse effects. Gebru is one of the most respected voices in the field of AI Ethics. In the past, Gebru has also spoken about big tech’s excessive (often unregulated) say on the AI landscape she hopes to create an independent space where researchers from varied backgrounds can come together and set an agenda for AI research that is rooted in their communities and experiences. Timnit Gebru launched Distributed Artificial Intelligence Research (DAIR) Institute, an independent, community-driven organisation that aims to counter Big Tech’s influence on the research and development of AI.
