Elon Musk, Tesla’s maverick CEO, launched a withering attack on tech behemoth Google on Thursday on social networking platform X.
Musk’s ire was intended at Google’s artificial intelligence (AI) programs, specifically its chatbot Gemini, which recently came under fire for its picture generating capability being branded as “woke” by certain users.
Musk did not mince words, claiming that Google had “overplayed their hand” with AI picture generation, exposing what he described as “insane racist, anti-civilizational programming.”
This criticism comes after Google admitted that Gemini had been providing inaccurate historical image renderings, causing the firm to temporarily suspend the service.
Despite Google’s assurances that it would work quickly to correct these mistakes, Musk was doubtful.
He took a direct shot at Gemini’s product head, Jack Krawczyk, claiming that he was a big contributor to what he saw as Google’s AI being “racist & sexist.”
Furthermore, Musk did not confine his critique to Google’s AI efforts. He also criticized what he sees as poor corporate diversity, equity, and inclusion practices, which he has previously expressed against other tech companies, notably Sam Altman’s OpenAI.
Musk, in his normal way, did not mince words, even charging bias in Google search results, claiming that a query on his phone got “pro-censorship” as the top two results.
While Google staff kept silent in response to Musk’s torrent of critiques, his comments highlight the ongoing debate over AI ethics and the duties of tech businesses.
