{"id":450870,"date":"2026-05-20T08:25:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T08:25:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/450870\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T08:25:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T08:25:11","slug":"the-ai-bots-are-coming-and-the-young-are-booing-not-applauding","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/450870\/","title":{"rendered":"The AI bots are coming and the young are booing, not applauding"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">By Adam Jourdan<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">LONDON, May 20 (Reuters) &#8211; The AI revolution is here and the boos are getting louder.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">As <a href=\"https:\/\/tech.yahoo.com\/ai\/\" data-ylk=\"slk:artificial intelligence;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;artificial intelligence&quot;}\" class=\"link \" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">artificial intelligence<\/a> reshapes industries and markets around the world, a sense of dread is deepening among young &#8220;digital natives&#8221; now entering the \u200cworkforce, fearful of the impact on jobs and daily life as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini become household names.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">In a speech \u200cthis week, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt told graduating University of Arizona students that the impact of AI would be &#8220;larger, faster, and more consequential&#8221; than anything before.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">&#8220;It will touch \u200bevery profession, every classroom, every hospital, every laboratory, every person, and every relationship you have,&#8221; he said as boos rang out even as he addressed anxieties about job security and an uncertain future.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">How real those fears are was on show in an announcement by Standard Chartered on Tuesday that it will cut over 7,000 jobs and replace &#8220;lower-value human capital&#8221; with AI.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Many tech firms are also cutting staff, citing AI. Meta, which \u200cis installing tracking software on U.S.-based employees&#8217; computers \u2060to train its AI model, is planning to lay off 10% of its workforce globally starting this month.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Amazon.com has axed some 30,000 corporate jobs in recent months as it pushes AI and efficiency, while in \u2060February fintech firm Block cut nearly half its staff.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The Iran war is also softening hiring.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Schmidt acknowledged the young generation&#8217;s fears and called them &#8220;rational,&#8221; but just like the current top executives he painted the change and disruption AI was bringing as something inevitable that everyone needed to adapt to.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">GEN Z: ANGRIER \u200bAND \u200bMORE ANXIOUS ABOUT AI<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">However, even as CEOs embrace AI, there have been signs \u200bof pushback: from Chinese courts, to unions at South \u200cKorean carmakers, Hollywood scriptwriters and India&#8217;s film industry.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">And perhaps the clearest sign of discomfort with the vision of the world offered by tech companies is the rising discontent among America&#8217;s youth.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">An April report from Gallup showed that a rising number of Generation Z &#8211; those born between 1997 and 2012 &#8211; were anxious or angry about AI, while those who said they were hopeful or excited by it had fallen sharply compared with a year earlier.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Nearly half of respondents said the risks of AI outweigh the benefits, while 15% said it was a \u200cnet positive, a much bleaker view than a year ago. Most recognized the \u200bneed to be AI-savvy but said it hindered deeper learning and creativity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">&#8220;Negative emotions \u200bhave intensified over the past year,&#8221; the report&#8217;s authors wrote \u200band noted that usage was starting to plateau. &#8220;Young adults in the workforce are significantly more likely to view \u200cAI as a risk than a benefit.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The data did \u200bshow that positive views of AI \u200bincreased with the level of usage and decreased amongst those who used it less.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">Schmidt&#8217;s frosty reception followed other recent shows of anger at AI. At the University of Central Florida on May 8, a real estate executive Gloria Caulfield was similarly heckled \u200band booed over a commencement speech on \u200cAI.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">&#8220;The rise of artificial intelligence is the next industrial revolution,&#8221; she said as boos rang out, catching her off guard. &#8220;What \u200bhappened? OK, I struck a chord&#8230; Only a few years ago AI was not a factor in our lives.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">The \u200broom burst out in cheers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"yf-1fy9kyt\">(Reporting by Adam JourdanEditing by Tomasz Janowski)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Adam Jourdan LONDON, May 20 (Reuters) &#8211; The AI revolution is here and the boos are getting&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":450871,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[345,6883,343,344,34465,85,46,125,210754,28775],"class_list":["post-450870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-ai-revolution","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-eric-schmidt","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-technology","tag-uncertain-future","tag-university-of-arizona"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450870"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450870\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450871"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}