Co-Opting AI: Debt

NYU’s Institute for Public Knowledge, Sloane Lab, and the Digital Technology for Democracy Lab at the University of Virginia invite you to a new discussion in the series “Co-Opting AI.” This will be a completely virtual event.

Please register here.

This event will discuss how AI’s predictive properties are entangled with social classification and the allocation of resources.

Simone Browne is Associate Professor in the Department of African and African Diaspora Studies, and Director of the Center for Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. She is currently writing her second book, which examines the interventions made by artists whose works grapple with the surveillance of Black life. She is an EPIC Advisory Board Member, and A People’s Guide to Tech Advisory Board Member. Her research focuses on the social and ethical implications of surveillance, both AI-enabled and not. Examining potential algorithmic harms and tech equity in order to better understand the development and impact of AI, her research ranges from the environmental impact of electronic waste to the effects of increased pollutant exposure experienced by those living near data and fulfillment centers. She is the author of Dark Matters: On the Surveillance of Blackness.

Erie Meyer, former chief technologist at the CFPB. At the CFPB, Meyer led a team of expert technologists, all of whom were recently dismissed by new CFPB leadership. She recently filed an affidavit in federal court concerning the CFPB’s records, data management practices, and the threat that mass data deletion would pose to the consumer protection work of the CFPB. Meyer served on the implementation team that launched the CFPB, and became a founding team member of the Bureau’s Office of Technology and Innovation. Before rejoining the CFPB in 2021, Ms. Meyer served as Senior Advisor to Chair Khan for Policy Planning and Chief Technologist for the Federal Trade Commission, and as then-Commissioner Chopra’s Technology Advisor. Before serving at the FTC, she launched the U.S. Digital Service in the White House.

Mona Sloane is an Assistant Professor of Data Science and Media Studies at the University of Virginia (UVA). As a sociologist, she studies the intersection of technology and society, specifically in the context of AI design, use, and policy. She also convenes the Co-Opting AI series and serves as the editor of the Co-Opting AI book series at the University of California Press as well as the Technology Editor for Public Books. At UVA, Mona runs Sloane Lab which conducts empirical research on the implications of technology for the organization of social life. Its focus lies on AI as a social phenomenon that intersects with wider cultural, economic, material, and political conditions. The lab spearheads social science leadership in applied work on responsible AI, public scholarship, and technology policy. More here: monasloane.org.

The Co-Opting AI event series is convened by Mona Sloane. It is hosted by NYU’s Institute for Public Knowledge, UVA’s Digital Technology for Democracy Lab, and Sloane Lab.