The political bias isn’t a glitch. It was built in.

NATE SILVER: Google abandoned “don’t be evil” — and Gemini is the result.

“I’ve long intended to write more about AI here at Silver Bulletin. It’s a major topic in my forthcoming book, and I’ve devoted a lot of bandwidth over the past few years to speaking with experts and generally educating myself on the terms of the debate over AI alignment and AI risk. I’d dare to say I’ve even developed some opinions of my own about these things. Nevertheless, AI is a deep, complex topic, and it’s easy to have an understanding that’s rich in some ways and patchy in others. Therefore, I’m going to pick my battles — and I was planning to ease into AI topics slowly with a fun post about how ChatGPT was and wasn’t helpful for writing my book.1

But then this month, Google rolled out a series of new AI models that it calls Gemini. It’s increasingly apparent that Gemini is among the more disastrous product rollouts in the history of Silicon Valley and maybe even the recent history of corporate America, at least coming from a company of Google’s prestige. Wall Street is starting to notice, with Google (Alphabet) stock down 4.5 percent on Monday amid analyst warnings about Gemini’s effect on Google’s reputation.

Gemini grabbed my attention because the overlap between politics, media and AI is a place on the Venn Diagram where think I can add a lot of value. Despite Google’s protestations to the contrary, the reasons for Gemini’s shortcomings are mostly political, not technological. Also, many of the debates about Gemini are familiar territory, because they parallel decades-old debates in journalism. Should journalists strive to promote the common good or instead just reveal the world for what it is? Where is the line between information and advocacy? Is it even possible or desirable to be unbiased — and if so, how does one go about accomplishing that?2 How should consumers navigate a world rife with misinformation — when sometimes the misinformation is published by the most authoritative sources? How are the answers affected by the increasing consolidation of the industry toward a few big winners — and by increasing political polarization in the US and other industrialized democracies?”

h/t John