BERLIN: The head of the Mozilla free software organisation spoke out against allowing global tech giants to control artificial intelligence (AI), in remarks made to dpa in Berlin on Sunday.
“It’s extremely important that the training data and results of the new AI functions can be controlled by the individual users and companies, and are not guided centrally by a few large companies,” Mitchell Baker said on the occasion of Mozilla’s 25th anniversary.
AI is likely to become the defining technology of the current generation in the way that the internet has changed the world for ever, Baker believes. “What we have seen over the past year scratches only the surface of what’s possible,” she said, predicting that AI would be used increasingly in products and user experience.
The benefits of the internet had reached billions of people, because one or two companies had not been allowed to dominate. “Nevertheless, looking back, there are many decisions that could have contributed to protecting competition and the private sphere,” she said.
With AI there was now the option of taking better decisions by developing rules to ensure greater transparency and responsibility.
The development of AI is currently being driven primarily by US tech giants. Microsoft is in alliance with AI startup OpenAI, offering services in its Bing browser and its Office and Cloud programs. Google is offering its Bard chatbot. Other leading AI companies include Facebook owner Meta, Adobe and chip designer Nvidia.
At the Mozilla celebrations, Baker pointed to “massive open-source activities” that could counter an internet and AI oligopoly. While the tech giants’ billions could not be matched, experiments with smaller models were ongoing that could be used on a laptop or smart phone. “These are big changes,” she said. – dpa
