SHIFT

We hop into the backseat of a police car and learn how officers in Rwanda have adopted and deployed AI on the streets of its capital city, Kigali.We Meet:Chief Inspector of Police Paul Ryamugwiza, director of traffic and road enforcement systems for Rwanda National PoliceCredits:The show is produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens. It’s mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

Potentially a quarter billion children worldwide lack access to an education. Advances in education tech and AI programs for learning can help students who have access to tools and internet. This episode, we bring you a conversation with members of the International Rescue Committee, an aid group developing tailored learning experiences for children in crisis. It was taped before a live audience at Web Summit, Europe’s largest tech conference, in Lisbon, Portugal.  This episode originally ran on November 29, 2023.We Meet:Atish Gonsalves, Global Lead for Research & Innovation in Education, International Rescue Committee (IRC)Morena Baccarin, Actor, IRC AmbassadorSara Wayne Callies, Actor, IRC AmbassadorCredits:SHIFT is produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It’s mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

We meet Dr. Fei-Fei Li In the latest installment of our oral history project. She's a Chinese-American computer scientist and the creator of ImageNet - the dataset that made rapid advances possible in this field of AI that helps computers take meaningful information from things like photos and videos.We Meet: Stanford University's Fei-Fei Li, author of "The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI"Credits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

Smart TVs that track what people watch and how they watch it give political campaigns a new trove of data to exploit, with little transparency on how it’s happening.We meet: Investigative Reporter Maggie Severns speaking about her article:https://www.notus.org/2024-election/streaming-tv-campaign-adsCredits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

A live conversation about the state of the space industry with serial space entrepreneur Kam Ghaffarian, a co-founder of Axiom Space, Intuitive Machines, Quantum Space, and more, from the mainstage at Collision Conference in Toronto, Canada.We meet: Dr. Kamal "Kam" GhaffarianCredits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

How do we minimize the risk of mid-air collisions between aircraft? And how does that change in the era of artificial intelligence and things like drone swarms?Claire Tomlin works on questions like these, and her work is now the basis of a new field of AI in which a system automatically learns operational and control objectives from data, while maintaining things like flight safety.We Meet: University of California Berkeley’s Claire Tomlin, 2024 IEEE Mildred Dresselhaus Medal recipient recognized “for foundational work in the design and verification of cyber-physical systems with applications to safety in autonomous systems”Credits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

A growing number of school kids are getting their writing assignments back with grades and feedback that were given by AI software.Teachers say these AI tools can help them grade papers faster but who’s grading the AI tools? We Meet: CalMatters Tech Reporter Khari Johnsonhttps://calmatters.org/economy/technology/2024/06/teachers-ai-grading/ Credits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

A team of computer scientists at the University of Chicago has built tools that let artists poison the training data embedded in their work, and fight back against those who scrape the internet to build generative AI models. We Meet: Nightshade Creator Ben Zhao, Neubauer Professor of Computer Science at the University of ChicagoCredits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

For some types of problems quantum computers can work exponentially faster than other types of supercomputers, but significant challenges remain to building useful quantum machines. We hear from one of the key players in the field and learn about his efforts to do so in the latest installment of our oral history project.We Meet: Google Quantum AI Lab Founder Hartmut Neven Credits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

A live conversation about the potential promises and pitfalls of AI in public health, hosted by Boston University's School of Public Health.We meet: Dr. David Cutler, Otto Eckstein Professor of Applied Economics in the Department of Economics at Harvard University, with secondary appointments at the Kennedy School of Government and the School of Public HealthDr. Alondra Nelson, Harold F. Linder Chair in the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study, former Deputy Assistant to President Joe Biden and Acting Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy  Greg Singleton, Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer at the US Department of Health and Human Services Credits:This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

A look at how generative AI is being used in the drug discovery process in this latest installment of our oral history project. We Meet: Insilico Medicine Founder and CEO Alex Zhavoronkov Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

Cornell University’s Elephant Listening Project has been trying to get real-time monitoring of the Central African Republic’s forest elephants for years. FruitPunch AI and a roster of other AI researchers are closer than ever to making that a reality. This week’s show is a special feature episode from our friends at the Click Here Podcast. We’ll be back with a new episode of SHIFT next week. Thanks for listening!

A look at how AI is helping and hurting cybersecurity in this latest installment of our oral history project. We Meet: Palo Alto Networks Chief Product Officer Lee Klarich Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

In this bonus episode, we tour Google's Project Starline at this year's TED Conference in Vancouver, Canada. We Meet: Andrew Nartker from Google’s Project Starline Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

The way we pay for things is changing dramatically, and it’s only going to become more invisible and integrated into our experiences going forward—like a car that can pay for gas or electric charging all on its own. We Meet: Mastercard President and CTO Ed McLaughlin Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

AI is being used to write stories that flood the internet with trash and spam, but it can also help journalists tell stories that can be personalized and updated automatically. In the latest installment of our oral history project, we look at how journalism story structures are evolving with AI. We Meet: Computational Journalist Francesco Marconi, co-founder of real-time information company Applied XL Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, and it was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

As more people try ChatGPT and other AI tools, our thoughts about what's fair or what to trust with generative AI are evolving. The Pew Research Center offers some of the most comprehensive surveys of American public opinion and has been studying these questions. We Meet:  Alec Tyson, Associate Director at Pew Research Center Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

The current AI ecosystem has plenty in common with the early days of the web. So, what have we learned? We Meet:  Mark Surman, President of Mozilla Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

Our trust in people, government, science and even our trust in technology—we have a lot less trust in all of it than we used to. Our lack of trust might even turn out to be the most bi-partisan thing about this US election cycle, especially our lack of trust in AI. We Meet: Richard Edelman, the president and chief executive officer of the public relations company Edelman Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.

Frank McCourt is an American executive and philanthropist. He’s also the author of a new book about the internet, called “Our Biggest Fight: Reclaiming Liberty, Humanity, and Dignity in the Digital Age”. We talk to him about that fight before a live audience in New York City at a gathering held by the responsible technology non-profit, All Tech Is Human. We Meet: Frank H. McCourt, Jr., civic entrepreneur and executive chairman of McCourt Global, founder and executive chairman of Project Liberty Credits: This episode of SHIFT was produced by Jennifer Strong with help from Emma Cillekens. It was mixed by Garret Lang, with original music from him and Jacob Gorski. Art by Anthony Green.