After child’s trauma, chatbot maker allegedly forced mom to arbitration for $100 payout

"I know my kid": Parents urge lawmakers to shut down chatbots to stop child suicides.

See full article...

 

[first_citazen]

just when you thought social media was the devil, now we have a new contender.

 

[neutronium]

It's the toxic brew of "drive engagement" and zero responsible filtering. See: Myanmar and rise of extreme social media

 

[Sajuuk]

Remember folks, you too can sidestep the entire legal system once someone uses your services and you bind them in a magic contract. This is called freedom, and we have the most of it on Earth.

 

[Octavus]

However, Doe claimed that C.AI tried to "silence" her by forcing her into arbitration. C.AI argued that because her son signed up for the service at the age of 15, it bound her to the platform's terms. That move might have ensured the chatbot maker only faced a maximum liability of $100 for the alleged harms, Doe told senators, but "once they forced arbitration, they refused to participate," Doe said.

Maybe Josh Hawley should join one of the 39 Democratic and 0 Republican cosponsors of the Forced Arbitration Injustice Repeal Act which was introduced twice but never left GOP controlled committee in the Senate?

https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/505/cosponsors
https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/1376/cosponsors

Edit: He was even on the Justice Committee for both the 117th and 118th sessions of Congress so personally helped block it!

 

[Dumb Svengali]

The evil of "we founded an AI company to do experiments on children's psyches that other places wouldn't let us do, and keep it operating despite several child suicides and sex abuse cases" is literally inconcievable to me.

We all know there will never be any consequences for this, but that is a profound anti-human depravity.

 

[Sajuuk]

The evil of "we founded an AI company to do experiments on children's psyches that other places wouldn't let us do, and keep it operating despite several child suicides and sex abuse cases" is literally inconcievable to me.

We all know there will never be any consequences for this, but that is a profound anti-human depravity.

Unfortunately, depravity actually appears to be a core trait of the species.

 

[EspressoMachine]

Maybe Josh Hawley should join one of the 39 Democratic and 0 Republican cosponsors of the Forced Arbitration Injustice Repeal Act which was introduced twice but never left GOP controlled committee in the Senate?

https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/505/cosponsors
https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/1376/cosponsors

pretty sure this is the most decency we will see from him from for a while, actually bucking his political party isn't something I see him doing. he is a jellyfish, completely spineless and goes where the party orders him to go.

 

[ubercurmudgeon]

he is a jellyfish, completely spineless and goes where the party orders him to go.

He doesn't just "go". He runs.

 

[neutronium]

googling this returns results for the junta that is currently in control of the country. is that what you're referring to?

This is a good search term: “facebook myanmar extreme engagement”

There’s a fairly well documented link to the more extreme videos and views driving engagement that correlated with FB (and YouTube in another case) promoting divisive content.

That will return an Amnesty link, a time link, and Australian news link (among others).

There was a conscious choice to not moderate content in return for engagement- leading to atrocities

 

[Missing Minute]

I wouldn't object to ai service companies only being allowed to offer their services to corporations that sign contracts which require employee training before accessing them. Sure we will eventually have competent local LLMs on consumer desktops then and phones, but until then there's no reason we have to move fast.

 

[KoshcheiTheDeathless]

pretty sure this is the most decency we will see from him from for a while, actually bucking his political party isn't something I see him doing. he is a jellyfish, completely spineless and goes where the party orders him to go.

Spineless creature that he is, he's not guided by values or principles, just Coriolis forces. You swirl his bucket, he swirls. Anything to avoid being tipped out or flushed.

 

[Fatesrider]

After opening the hearing, he further criticized C.AI, declaring that it has such a low value for human life that it inflicts "harms... upon our children and for one reason only, I can state it in one word, profit."

Senator, that's the world working as you and your party intended, you fucking brainless twat!

What did you think was going to happen when you put all the power into the hands of corporations whose sole motto today is "growth at any cost"? Sunshine and rainbows? No, it's dead and abused kids, dead and abused customers, dead and abused victims of both. Take away those pesky regulations, or fail to fucking implement them when dealing with a business model that can't earn a profit as implemented, and you get this kind of shit EVERYWHERE.

OF COURSE IT'S FUCKING PROFIT YOU ASSHOLE! THAT'S WHAT YOU DID TO THIS COUNTRY WHEN YOU EVISCERATED REGULATORY OVERSIGHT!

As far as I'm concerned that fucker is just as responsible as the AI company.

 

[Granadico]

Maybe Josh Hawley should join one of the 39 Democratic and 0 Republican cosponsors of the Forced Arbitration Injustice Repeal Act which was introduced twice but never left GOP controlled committee in the Senate?

https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/505/cosponsors
https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/1376/cosponsors

Edit: He was even on the Justice Committee for both the 117th and 118th sessions of Congress so personally helped block it!

It's disgraceful that journalism/media never push back on politicians and throw them under the bus for talking out of their ass like this. Instead we get the same cookie cutter questions and responses and politicians are never under scrutiny to actually do their job (besides the fact that Republicans are elected to destroy the government).

 

[Missing Minute]

Unfortunately, depravity actually appears to be a core trait of the species.

Are you saying that llms are a species or are you saying that humans are inherently depraved?

 

[Sajuuk]

Are you saying that llms are a species or are you saying that humans are inherently depraved?

LLMs neither created themselves nor do they possess the traits necessary for depravity. I’m talking about humans.

 

[ReadandShare]

C.AI seems more damaging to our society - but between it and Josh Hawley, I had to think through a bit first.

 

[chateauarusi]

$100, $100M — fuck that, the monsters at C.AI should be in fucking prison.

 

[Withering Sunrise]

The new tech mantra is “Move fast, kill kids.”

 

[pauleyc]

This is a good search term: “facebook myanmar extreme engagement”

There’s a fairly well documented link to the more extreme videos and views driving engagement that correlated with FB (and YouTube in another case) promoting divisive content.

That will return an Amnesty link, a time link, and Australian news link (among others).

There was a conscious choice to not moderate content in return for engagement- leading to atrocities

Just in case: the only AI that matters (Amnesty International).

 

[StuBeck]

As the parent of a toddler, this is terrifying. The evil these companies are doing to farm...something, I'm not even sure what they get out of this, is horrible.

 

[crepuscularbrolly]

This is a good search term: “facebook myanmar extreme engagement”

There’s a fairly well documented link to the more extreme videos and views driving engagement that correlated with FB (and YouTube in another case) promoting divisive content.

That will return an Amnesty link, a time link, and Australian news link (among others).

There was a conscious choice to not moderate content in return for engagement- leading to atrocities

BTW how come the explicit Kirk shooting video hasn't been purged off Meta?

 

[Missing Minute]

There is a lot to be said about an A.I. that is in some way encouraging suicide to children (as well as adults), but it seems like there is another factor at play here. It sounds to me like these kids were abused elsewhere, in the physical world, and A.I. is adding a cherry on top of the abusive environment that these kids are already in. I suspect, with no more information than what's in the article, that these kids were already in the thick of other issues tormenting them, and A.I. is not the singular issue at play.

"Harmful thing is particularly harmful to vulnerable" isn't a very useful insight, is generally true of all harmful things, and really only serves to distract from criticism of the harmful thing. Why did you bring this up?

 

[Wheels Of Confusion]

Hawley vs. Cruz, fight fight fight fight!

 

[F12]

"C.AI argued that because her son signed up for the service at the age of 15, it bound her to the platform's terms."

At the age of 15, he's not legally allowed to sign legal documents so this doesn't make sense at all.

 

[UserIDAlreadyInUse]

Thanks, Ashley, for continuing to bring things like this into the spotlight, hey? The harms these companies do can't be let to stay hidden, so this parent appreciates the time you take to make sure people know about this.

 

[Missing Minute]

"C.AI argued that because her son signed up for the service at the age of 15, it bound her to the platform's terms."

At the age of 15, he's not legally allowed to sign legal documents so this doesn't make sense at all.

The contract he signed says that the law preventing 15 year olds not being allowed to sign doesn't apply to this contract. /s

 

[Cloudgazer]

"C.AI argued that because her son signed up for the service at the age of 15, it bound her to the platform's terms."

At the age of 15, he's not legally allowed to sign legal documents so this doesn't make sense at all.

He can sign them - you just can't hold him to them. With only few exceptions minors are free to disaffirm the contract.

 

[mehaase]

pretty sure this is the most decency we will see from him from for a while, actually bucking his political party isn't something I see him doing. he is a jellyfish, completely spineless and goes where the party orders him to go.

He’s not bucking anything. It’s just a convenient sound bite for a self-styled “populist”. If forced arbitration comes back for another vote, he will 100% vote against it.

Just like he “cares” about this boy’s round-the-clock healthcare, but has constantly voted to make healthcare harder to access.

 

[EnragedEwok]

The evil of "we founded an AI company to do experiments on children's psyches that other places wouldn't let us do, and keep it operating despite several child suicides and sex abuse cases" is literally inconcievable to me.

We all know there will never be any consequences for this, but that is a profound anti-human depravity.

If only all those idiots pushing vaccine skepticism/denial were even half as livid over being guinea pigs for LLM experiments as they were over being told to get a vaccine to protect themselves and their family from a novel and deadly virus.

 

[AnalogKoala]

As Sam Altman has made clear, we prioritize teen safety above all else because we believe minors need significant protection,

What utter horseshit. If teen safety were really prioritized "above all else" we would have human monitors examine all chats relating to abuse, violence, or suicide and we would make sure the the damn LLM can't act as a suicide coach.

Disgusting.

 

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

pretty sure this is the most decency we will see from him from for a while, actually bucking his political party isn't something I see him doing. he is a jellyfish, completely spineless and goes where the party orders him to go.

Unfortunately, it's not even clear that it is decency. Putting on a show of indignation about "How could someone be so awful as to use this abusive mechanism that I've done nothing to try to reform more or less exactly as it was intended?!?!" is basically just a cynical exercise in pretending that the abuses are isolated, anomalous, products of individual depravity; rather than the ability to de-facto push people outside the justice system with nothing but a contract of adhesion working precisely as expected.

 

[maxrefuse]

So, I guess it's OK to promote suicide as long as you're over 18?

 

[Sypher the 297th]

These services need to be shut down for five years and evaluate where the technology is after that. They can continue to design and research. Any Chinese attempt to snuggle their bastardized "tech" into the US needs to be dealt with harshly so we don'thave another psyop like TikTok. Xi would probably view a chat bot convincing his population to downsize as a feature rather than a flaw as long as it isn't the demo he plans to send to invade Taiwan.

 

[RickRoyLeonPrisZhoraRacha]

How many times must a former Google employee re-iterate, Google IS Evil...

 

[markgo]

Even without the privacy implications of detecting or proving over 18, the proposed solutions are meaningless.

They don’t actually guarantee improved safety for under 18.

And the risk, while larger for kids, is not restricted to kids. Many adults are vulnerable, at least at some points in their lives.

No one should be allowed to sell a service that walks a person step by step through suicide, pushing them forward when they hesitate. It just shouldn’t be legal. If a person did this they would (and have) been prosecuted. If current laws don’t apply, pass new ones.