NY Times Rebuttal

I just read an article from the New York Times about another "AI is gonna destroy humanity" concept. Ho-hum.

I'm kind of getting tired of people crying "wolf!", and hollering "the sky is falling!". The only reason I'm taking issue with this one is the concept that the author, Kai-Fu Lee, makes in his second to last paragraph:

"So if most countries will not be able to tax ultra-profitable A.I. companies to subsidize their workers, what options will they have? I foresee only one: Unless they wish to plunge their people into poverty, they will be forced to negotiate with whichever country supplies most of their A.I. software — China or the United States — to essentially become that country’s economic dependent, taking in welfare subsidies in exchange for letting the “parent” nation’s A.I. companies continue to profit from the dependent country’s users...."

Seriously?

Why does the rest of the world still think that we are some monstrously rich nation-state that can just pay for the rest of the world? Granted, AI is eating our lunch right now. But come on, people, let's use some common sense. There are hundreds of thousands of people in America that are just as displaced from AI and machines taking their jobs. Do you hear them hollering that India needs to pay their way? Well, some actually are, but most of us know better. And frankly, Mr. Lee, you should too.

Massive taxation will NOT solve where the money will come from for a universal basic income. What WILL solve this dilemma is all the stinking data that EVERY individual human on this planet generates. Even the smallest backwoods company taps into that data for streamlining their operations. What needs to happen is tieing that data into a blockchain that places a monetary value to it for the individual that generates that data. Then the individual gets a portion of the payment that the backwoods company paid to XYZ megacorp that audits and compiles the data stream.

Until this happens, the mega corporations are gonna fight taxation tooth and nail. You think there is a problem with offshore holdings now? You ain't seen nothin' yet.

UBI

Consider for a moment all the networked devices you use on a daily basis. Now think about whether you have them secured against hacking. Most of us do, of course.

Now consider this: Most, if not all, of those devices are generating gigabytes of data at the very least. That data is based on our usage of the devices. The parent companies that sell the devices are harvesting every kilobyte they can get out of them hourly. And what do they do with that data? It gets sold to companies that compile that information in ways we consumers can't even comprehend. This is OUR data, folks. Whether or not you opted in or out, the device is still sending a minimum of data to the parent company.

Now consider this: As technology in aggregate continues to improve, it will be next to impossible to avoid working with some kind of networked "smart" device over the course of your day, either at home or in your job. And there is more data harvested about our habits.

There is a movement brewing pertaining to something called a "universal basic income". This is supposed to meet the needs of every individual on the planet over the course of time. But what scares the bejesus out of both government and corporate officials is, where will the money come from?

Well there is an answer. All that data that is generated from every person on the planet. It's our data. Wouldn't it make sense if we were personally compensated for it? I'm not saying that we should be paid the hundreds of thousands of dollars that it's valued at. It would be nice, but it's unrealistic. What would be nice is a stipend of say $400 or $500 weekly?

What do you think, Facebook? Google? Samsung? Let's get a discussion going.