Microsoft layoffs
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Microsoft lays off team that taught employees how to make AI tools responsibly
Microsoft laid off its entire ethics and society team within the artificial intelligence organization as part of recent layoffs that affected 10,000 employees across the company, Platformer has learned.
The move leaves Microsoft without a dedicated team to ensure its AI principles are closely tied to product design at a time when the company is leading the charge to make AI tools available to the mainstream, current and former employees said.
Microsoft still maintains an active Office of Responsible AI, which is tasked with creating rules and principles to govern the company’s AI initiatives. The company says its overall investment in responsibility work is increasing despite the recent layoffs.
“Microsoft is committed to developing AI products and experiences safely and responsibly, and does so by investing in people, processes, and partnerships that prioritize this,” the company said in a statement. “Over the past six years we have increased the number of people across our product teams and within the Office of Responsible AI who, along with all of us at Microsoft, are accountable for ensuring we put our AI principles into practice. […] We appreciate the trailblazing work the Ethics & Society did to help us on our ongoing responsible AI journey.”
But employees said the ethics and society team played a critical role in ensuring that the company’s responsible AI principles are actually reflected in the design of the products that ship.
“People would look at the principles coming out of the office of responsible AI and say, ‘I don’t know how this applies,’” one former employee says. “Our job was to show them and to create rules in areas where there were none.”
In recent years, the team designed a role-playing game called Judgment Call that helped designers envision potential harms that could result from AI and discuss them during product development. It was part of a larger “responsible innovation toolkit” that the team posted publicly.
More recently, the team has been working to identify risks posed by Microsoft’s adoption of OpenAI’s technology throughout its suite of products.
Best comment:
"They replaced that team with a copy of Asimov's I, Robot.
A paper one."
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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I guess a lot of people these days take jobs with large corporations that have a flimsy at best connection to how the company makes money. I don’t know how shocked you should be to lose such a job.
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Microsoft lays off team that taught employees how to make AI tools responsibly
Microsoft laid off its entire ethics and society team within the artificial intelligence organization as part of recent layoffs that affected 10,000 employees across the company, Platformer has learned.
The move leaves Microsoft without a dedicated team to ensure its AI principles are closely tied to product design at a time when the company is leading the charge to make AI tools available to the mainstream, current and former employees said.
Microsoft still maintains an active Office of Responsible AI, which is tasked with creating rules and principles to govern the company’s AI initiatives. The company says its overall investment in responsibility work is increasing despite the recent layoffs.
“Microsoft is committed to developing AI products and experiences safely and responsibly, and does so by investing in people, processes, and partnerships that prioritize this,” the company said in a statement. “Over the past six years we have increased the number of people across our product teams and within the Office of Responsible AI who, along with all of us at Microsoft, are accountable for ensuring we put our AI principles into practice. […] We appreciate the trailblazing work the Ethics & Society did to help us on our ongoing responsible AI journey.”
But employees said the ethics and society team played a critical role in ensuring that the company’s responsible AI principles are actually reflected in the design of the products that ship.
“People would look at the principles coming out of the office of responsible AI and say, ‘I don’t know how this applies,’” one former employee says. “Our job was to show them and to create rules in areas where there were none.”
In recent years, the team designed a role-playing game called Judgment Call that helped designers envision potential harms that could result from AI and discuss them during product development. It was part of a larger “responsible innovation toolkit” that the team posted publicly.
More recently, the team has been working to identify risks posed by Microsoft’s adoption of OpenAI’s technology throughout its suite of products.
Best comment:
"They replaced that team with a copy of Asimov's I, Robot.
A paper one."
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Let's just hope they haven't replaced the team with an AI.
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Microsoft lays off team that taught employees how to make AI tools responsibly
Microsoft laid off its entire ethics and society team within the artificial intelligence organization as part of recent layoffs that affected 10,000 employees across the company, Platformer has learned.
The move leaves Microsoft without a dedicated team to ensure its AI principles are closely tied to product design at a time when the company is leading the charge to make AI tools available to the mainstream, current and former employees said.
Microsoft still maintains an active Office of Responsible AI, which is tasked with creating rules and principles to govern the company’s AI initiatives. The company says its overall investment in responsibility work is increasing despite the recent layoffs.
“Microsoft is committed to developing AI products and experiences safely and responsibly, and does so by investing in people, processes, and partnerships that prioritize this,” the company said in a statement. “Over the past six years we have increased the number of people across our product teams and within the Office of Responsible AI who, along with all of us at Microsoft, are accountable for ensuring we put our AI principles into practice. […] We appreciate the trailblazing work the Ethics & Society did to help us on our ongoing responsible AI journey.”
But employees said the ethics and society team played a critical role in ensuring that the company’s responsible AI principles are actually reflected in the design of the products that ship.
“People would look at the principles coming out of the office of responsible AI and say, ‘I don’t know how this applies,’” one former employee says. “Our job was to show them and to create rules in areas where there were none.”
In recent years, the team designed a role-playing game called Judgment Call that helped designers envision potential harms that could result from AI and discuss them during product development. It was part of a larger “responsible innovation toolkit” that the team posted publicly.
More recently, the team has been working to identify risks posed by Microsoft’s adoption of OpenAI’s technology throughout its suite of products.
Best comment:
"They replaced that team with a copy of Asimov's I, Robot.
A paper one."
@George-K said in Microsoft layoffs:
Microsoft laid off its entire ethics and society team within the artificial intelligence organization as part of recent layoffs that affected 10,000 employees across the company, Platformer has learned.
We might have a match
Air Force goes on diversity, equity, inclusion hiring spree: Top job pays up to $183,500
The Air Force is looking to build a 'world-class' DEI program
The U.S. Air Force this month launched an effort to hire a handful of senior-level diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) managers and is hoping to place these officials in posts across the country, from Washington, D.C., to Alaska.
Each post pays at least $82,000 per year, and the top position at the Pentagon could pay more than $180,000 per year.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/air-force-diversity-equity-inclusion-hiring-spree-top-job
