The New York Times reported that “Bill Gates, the billionaire co-founder of Microsoft, is loudly warning that artificial intelligence poses a grave threat to jobs and human life, and that urgently addressing the risks should be “the world’s top priority.”” The August 26, 2026 article entitled “Bill Gates Warns A.I. Is More Dangerous Than Big Tech Will Admit” (https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/26/technology/bill-gates-ai-risks.htm) included these comments from Reporter Karen Weise based on her interview last week:
In an hourlong interview with The New York Times last week, Mr. Gates said the tech industry was knowingly downplaying those threats because there was too much money on the line.
“In private, people who understand how good this stuff is, and how much better it’s getting, they’re very worried,” he said. But few tech executives, Mr. Gates said, are willing to publicly admit that. “They’re now saying to each other: ‘Hey, man, don’t say that. It’s bad for us — the next trillion dollars we’re trying to raise.’”
On Wednesday, Mr. Gates published a nearly 6,000-word essay on his personal website laying out his concerns about A.I. and offering solutions, such as new taxes and bans. He said he was motivated to speak now because recent improvements in A.I. had far surpassed his expectations and because the industry had ignored technology milestones — like A.I.’s escaping the control of its creators or making recipes for bioweapons — that it once said would warrant more caution.
“They’re just full speed ahead and hoping that the good outweighs the bad,” he said.
Mr. Gates, 70, is the latest in a string of tech luminaries to call out the risks of A.I. as the industry spends trillions of dollars on new data centers, and as young A.I. companies edge toward some of the largest initial public offerings in history.
No surprises here!
First published at https://www.vogelitlaw.com/blog/microsoft-founder-bill-gates-warns-of-ai-dangers