STAND podcast: Mike Matthys discusses internet censorship, artificial intelligence

By KELLY TSHIBAKA

In the ‘80s and ‘90s, movies like the Terminator series, space-age technology, and the dot com boom gave rise to some science fiction technophobe speculation – robots will take over someday, artificial intelligence will determine that mankind is irrelevant and eliminate it, and sentient technology will replace humans as our leaders.

Most Americans dismissed this paranoia as a passing frenzy and chalked up Terminator as a blockbuster sci-fi action movie.

However, these fears may not be as unfounded as most once believed. On a recent interview of STAND with Kelly and Niki Tshibaka, Mike Matthys, founder of the Institute for Better Internet, discussed the very real danger of A.I.

Matthys warned that although we haven’t quite reached Terminator-levels of danger, our natural rights are very much at risk.

Matthys covered the concern of First Amendment violations that come with A.I.’s emergence. The exchange of free ideas, reliable information, and government neutrality are all at risk with the rising dominance of A.I. monopolies. He went on to break down the reason A.I. is such a pressing danger: It threatens our privacy, infringes on our First Amendment rights, and manipulates history with biased outputs. 

For example, Matthys recounted a conference he attended in Washington, D.C., during which he learned that ChatGPT cannot generate an image of Bill and Hillary Clinton with blood on their hands, but can generate such an image for Donald Trump. 

This is not the only example of A.I. bias. Google Gemini has faced extreme criticism recently for its A.I. generated images that portrayed historical figures with the incorrect ethnicity or the opposite gender. President George Washington was portrayed as Black, the pope was portrayed as female, an image of Vikings depicted exclusively Black people in traditional Viking attire, and Gemini said it could not produce any image of historical figures like Abraham Lincoln. Google paused on Gemini’s ability to generate images of people, and eventually said it corrected the error, but the concern still stands.

Despite the growing concern surrounding A.I., not all hope is lost. Matthys described “safety, transparency, neutrality and accountability” as critical guardrails to reasonably containing A.I. He went on to discuss the guardrails in more detail.

“Safety means that not all content should be public, there is some content that is truly harmful. Transparency means to publish content moderation rules and enforcement actions. Neutrality means platforms need to avoid taking sides. Accountability means these companies that are effectively monopoly parties need some third party to hold them accountable to make sure they stay within these guardrails.”

With these parameters in place, Matthys was confident that A.I. will not trample on our freedom of speech further than it already has.

It is critical to preserve our First Amendment rights and our privacy. As Matthys said during his interview, “fairness and progress are achieved only when all voices are heard.”

If you’d like to hear more about Mike Matthys’ insight into the dangers of A.I. and the solutions for protecting freedom and privacy in this new era, you won’t want to miss the newest episode of STAND. You can also view the episode on YouTube, Rumble, and your podcast streaming platform.

Kelly Tshibaka is the host of the podcast, TV, and radio show STAND, and the 2022 Alaska Republican candidate for U.S. Senate. She co-hosts the show with her husband, Niki Tshibaka.