AI Boom Faces a Growing Public Backlash

Author: Bloomberg Television · Watch on YouTube

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Original language: English

Original video: AI Boom Faces a Growing Public Backlash · Channel: Bloomberg Television · 10:01 · Watch on YouTube

Topics: AI content generation, AI governance and regulation, Markets and economy, Health and science

Summary

The Atlantic CEO Nick Thompson discusses AI’s mixed effects on journalism, the public’s growing skepticism, and the challenge of turning rapidly advancing models into measurable economic benefits. He argues that AI could eventually boost productivity, though companies and leaders are still learning how to use it effectively, and says antitrust policy is especially important. The conversation then turns to Thompson’s running, the role it has played in his relationship with his father, and how its daily discipline helps organize the rest of his life.

Key points

The Atlantic uses AI for marketing and analysis, including agents that examine Google Search Console data, but Thompson also sees risks to traffic, competition, and relationships with readers.
Thompson says he is an unusually enthusiastic AI user because experimenting with it helps him make better decisions for his company.
He has noticed stronger public resistance to AI, and says polls show support declining in the United States.
People may use AI for everyday tasks while still expressing fear or negative opinions about the technology.
Thompson notes that young people may be among AI’s most frequent users and strongest critics, in part because they see its drawbacks and hear concerns about jobs and safety.
Although AI companies’ infrastructure spending far exceeds their revenue, Thompson points to OpenAI’s $40 billion in revenue as evidence of substantial demand.
He suggests the economy could be on a J-curve: AI may initially disrupt workflows or produce poor results, before eventually improving productivity and economic output.
Thompson argues that antitrust policy is a key regulatory concern, while companies are learning to integrate AI across organizations and use it in back-office processes.
Running has been a spiritual and meditative practice for Thompson and a central connection with his father.
Thompson says the consistency required for running helps him maintain discipline and organize other parts of his life.

Chapters

Start	Chapter	Summary
00:00	AI and the journalism business	Nick Thompson describes the benefits of AI for The Atlantic alongside risks to its traffic, competition, and relationship with readers.
02:06	Public attitudes and the AI economy	The discussion considers growing public backlash, the gap between AI capabilities and economic impact, and the possibility of a productivity J-curve.
05:16	Regulation and workplace adoption	Thompson discusses policymakers’ and executives’ understanding of AI, emphasizing antitrust and more effective organization-wide implementation.
06:49	Running, family, and discipline	Thompson reflects on running as a spiritual practice, a bond with his father, and a daily source of discipline.

Quotes

So yes, lots of problems, but lots of benefits. — 01:03

I felt the backlash this week in a way I haven’t felt it before. — 02:06

So, it is possible that we are on a J curve when it comes to the larger economy — 04:45

My view is the most important regulatory policy to get right is antitrust — 05:47

If you do go out and you are consistent, you will get much better at it. — 09:30

Concepts and entities

AI, agent orchestration, J curve, antitrust, The Atlantic, Nick Thompson, OpenAI, Google Search Console, ChatGPT, The Running Ground

Full transcript (original language)

00:00 We were talking about this with Jonathan Gollub just a moment ago. This week investors are reluctant to make big bets as they take stock of a tech route fueled by doubts about the sustainability of all the heavy spending we’ve seen on the global AI build out. >> That’s right. But as Wall Street maybe starts to question if the technology can keep pace with these massive CapEx expenditures, we spoke to someone who knows quite a bit about setting pace. That’s the Atlantic CEO Nick Thompson. In addition to running the publication, he runs a lot. Next week Nick will be racing in the New York City Marathon. We talked to him about tech as well as his book, The Running Ground.

00:32 We wanted to have you on to talk about the marathon and your >> We’ll get there. I think we’re going to get there. >> We’re going to get there, but um the other thing that I feel like we’re talking on a marathon loop about these days is AI. >> I I hear it’s important. I hear it’s a thing. >> Yeah. >> Um my approach to AI is la la la la but um others of us have have a better more >> Not quite a Luddite, but yeah. >> As someone who writes and is in journalism, I mean, you cover this. You’re a publisher. What is it doing to the industry? Is it Is it all bad? >> It’s not all bad. I mean, it’s an

01:03 amazing tool in all kinds of ways, right? So I’m CEO, I run the business side. We use it in all kinds of interesting marketing efforts, right? We use it in all kinds of analytical efforts. I’ve got agents right now analyzing Google Search Console data looking for patterns, right? So we use it in remarkably positive ways, but it is a huge threat in part because we could lose our Google traffic, in part because the competitive landscape changes, in part because they’re now AI intermediaries between us and our readers, in part because reading habits will change in ways that might be bad for us. So yes, lots of problems, but lots of benefits.

01:34 >> Do you Do you find that you are an outlier in embracing it to the degree to which you are? >> I’m an extreme outlier, absolutely. Yeah, no question about it. Like I use it all the time. I use it all the time both because I’m fascinated by it and because it helps me, but also because I think if I understand it better, I will be able to make better choices for my company. So that’s why I do all this agent orchestration and stuff. >> I mean, that’s probably a rational adult approach to AI. I’m going the opposite direction. >> I will tell you though that I felt the backlash this week in a way I haven’t felt it before. I was doing an event in

02:06 Iowa and just out in Des Moines and you could just tell that like the way the room was responding, everything that’s kind of anti-AI is like, yes. Everything that’s pro-AI I was like, hmm. And I can kind of feel public sentiment turning. Obviously, the polls are showing that support of AI in this country, not in the rest of the world, is going way down and you can feel that more now than you could a month ago, 2 months ago, 6 months ago. >> But that’s so fascinating to me because I am shocked at the pace at which normal people in my life have adopted using ChatGPT for they’ve

02:38 outsourced basic cognitive tasks. It’s just like the the snap of a I had a friend who was sick the other day and he’s like, oh, so I you know, I was talking to Chad about my symptoms. I was like, dude, just like Google it. Put it into WebMD. Or I have another friend who runs a boutique ad firm and she uses AI for all kinds of like initial tranches of creativity and I’m I’m shocked at how willing people are to do that while at the same time if you ask them how they feel about AI, they’re fearful of it or they have a negative opinion about it. How do we reconcile those two things? It’s like when you ask somebody about junk food, no, I don’t like it, but it’s in my grocery cart cuz it’s easy.

03:09 >> I mean, look at the it’s interesting if you look at the cohorts of people and how they feel about AI, it’s young people who dislike it the most and they’re also probably the ones who are using it the most, right? They’re all using it in school, but they see the costs, they see the drawbacks, they hear all the talk about first you’re going to lose your job and now the new marketing of the AI companies is we’re going to kill you, right? So, it’s like not the best slogan. So, I think they’re feeling a lot of heat. >> You talk about this week and it kind of it is a a pivot point and I think from a markets perspective, I think that this is a a moment at which people are saying, look, this perhaps is the year of infrastructure. Maybe next year we’ll

03:41 see more building of infrastructure as well, but there has to be proof in the pudding at at some point. Is your sense of timing that as well as you look at kind of the arc of this unwritten story? Where are we in that that journey toward having to find some means of making this profitable and develop the use case or explain the use case to people? >> will say that, I mean, obviously the amount that the big AI companies spend on infrastructure versus the revenue they get is there’s a huge gap. Yes. But OpenAI has $40 billion in revenue. Like that is a lot of revenue. Like people are spending, people are buying. So, I still don’t know whether you know, the valuations of these

04:15 companies will be justified, but abs- the growth trajectories are insane. And then there’s a really interesting question. So, the biggest gap to me in AI is capabilities of the frontier AI models go like this. Actual impact on the American economy goes like this, right? And the question is why is there that overhang? And one hypothesis, which could be true, is that this is going to be my third air chart that I’ve drawn for you, but it’s Bloomberg, right? >> Okay, we’re a radio first audience, but just so our radio audience knows there’s a lot of important air charts happening right now. >> You can imagine. So, the first air chart was an upward line, then it was like a

04:45 flat line. Now we have a J curve, right? And a J curve means initial productivity when a company starts to use AI, nothing happens or maybe it gets worse cuz you do AI slop, you’re confused, but eventually you turn around and starts to get much better. So, it is possible that we are on a J curve when it comes to the larger economy and many of these businesses, and soon you will start to see real benefits in productivity and in economic output. >> It’s interesting cuz when we have lawmakers on, we always ask the same question. Do you think Washington, do you think lawmakers understand AI well

05:16 enough to regulate it? And universally, the answer has been no. And this week I was on a panel with some chief technology officer officers for big banks, and I I changed the question to you, do you think C-suite members understand this well enough to implement it? And the response was also no. >> Yeah. >> So, how do we get the people making these decisions to get educated or understand this technology well enough to utilize it to a point where it is profitable or it is beneficial? >> Well, the regulator question or the C-suite question? >> Either or both. >> So, the regulator question is very

05:47 interesting because it is now a big political issue, and it is a big political issue in the midterms. And I think people are seeing that their voters will make decisions on AI, so they’re starting to learn about it. The number of senators who care about AI is going up. Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll get better regulatory policy, right? My view is the most important regulatory policy to get right is antitrust, so that you actually get a dispersion of wealth, so you don’t get a consolidation of power, so you actually have a real capitalistic competition. There are all kinds of regulations that people who get excited about AI and

06:18 regulating it can implement that would be backwards on antitrust and therefore unhelpful. So, I do think that there are paths in which you get worse policy outcomes as the politicians get more excited about it at the beginning. Maybe there’s a J-curve in regulatory sensibility, and it gets worse, and then it gets a little bit better. In the C-suite, I do think you’re going to be at a different stage. So, initially CEOs, executives were like, AI, shiny toy. My board wants to >> at it. Have as many tokens as you want,

06:49 yeah. >> And let’s have like a a head of AI implementation. I think what companies are learning now is that it’s much more effective in back office processes as opposed to front offices. It’s better if it’s incorporated through the whole organization, not just through your AI innovation team. I think companies are learning how to use it better, so I think that problem will fix itself. >> It’s going to be a tough segue into running. Maybe you can do an air chart of Heartbreak Hill for us or something to make [laughter] that turn. Are you running in the marathon in New York City? >> in November. >> many times has this been? >> I think this might be my 13th New York Marathon, 12th New York Marathon. >> You’ve written this book about running.

07:21 >> Yeah. >> What does it give you? What what has it throughout your life, what has made it something that’s captivated so much of your interest? >> Well, I I feel like it is a It’s almost, you know, spiritual or meditative. Like, it is a very important part of what makes me me and how I process thought and how I am in the world and how I I outside. As I write in the book, it was a central connection point between me and my father who had this remarkable rise and fall in his life and even as he was

07:52 bankrupt, you know, running a institution of low repute in Southeast Asia, even as that was happening in his life, he and I stayed close in part through running. So, it’s a book about how to run faster, it’s a book about how to use running as sort of a spiritual force in your life. And it’s also a book about how to love a complicated >> hated man. >> I was looking up some reviews of this book before you came on. Um and I’m going to read you this thing from Reddit, which I saw you commented on, so I know you’ve seen >> This is my This is my favorite Reddit review. I love this book. Easily a top five memoir

08:25 for me. On the surface, it sounds quite boring. Who would want to read a book about some guy running? But the answer to why do you run for Nick and others mentioned your story was very powerful. And >> Oh, that’s great. That’s a great comment. >> I know when I first learned We’ve known each other on off for a while. When I first learned that you were doing this, I think we were in some green room and I just said, “Why? >> [laughter] >> Like why are you doing You also do ultra marathons. You ran your fastest your fastest Oh my goodness. You ran your fastest marathon in your 40s.” >> Yes. >> And I just why? And you said, “Well, it’s it’s cheaper than sports cars.” But >> Still true. Yes.

08:57 >> There is something about this that really gives you, it seems like a purpose and a focus. And does that Does that overflow [clears throat] into other areas of your life? >> I think so. I do think that I mean, I get into this partly in my book. Like we’re getting pretty deep for, you know, 1 minute into this conversation, but you know, my father, his life fell apart in part because he sort of lost discipline and lost like some kind of central organizing process in his life. And he told me that would happen to me. And I think that’s one reason why running, which is very You have to be

09:30 very consistent about it. If you want to be good at it, you have to go out. You have to run every day. The interesting thing about running, if you want to be good at it, you have to go out and be consistent. If you do go out and you are consistent, you will get much better at it. Like it is an amazing thing. Like you put in the work, you get better. It happens every time. And so, having that >> that goes like this? >> Yeah. >> [laughter] >> So many charts. I’m I’m done I I’m maxed out on charts really on this interview. I I spent them all. Um but the point is that having this discipline as part of every day of my

10:01 life, I think is helpful for organizing the rest of my life. >> And I think that’s true of a lot of people, where they feel like once they start running, the rest of their life kind of comes together and makes more sense. Nick, thank you very much. Appreciate it. >> It’s great to be here. >> Good luck. >> Thank you.