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• The tech industry has been debating the existential risks of artificial intelligence.
• Microsoft’s biggest concern is whether AI’s benefits will be shared broadly, its Copilot boss says.
• Microsoft has increasingly adopted “diffusion” as a central theme in its public AI messaging.

As the technology industry debates the existential risks of artificial intelligence, Microsoft‘s Copilot boss says the biggest concern is making sure the technology’s benefits spread broadly rather than consolidating into a handful of companies.

Jacob Andreou, Microsoft’s executive vice president of Copilot, told Business Insider in an interview the AI risk that Microsoft spends most of its time thinking about is what it calls “diffusion,” or making AI widely available to people and businesses throughout the economy.

“How do we take raw intelligence and turn it into something that can be a true rising-tide benefit to people in their personal lives, and then certainly to the people that make up all of these corporations, and the broad economy?” Andreou said. “In a world where we fail to accomplish that diffusion, I do worry about what it looks like as value and as the economy centralizes into, like, a couple companies.”

A polarizing debate over AI’s long-term impact has erupted lately. Optimists argue the technology could dramatically increase productivity and create new industries, while critics warn that the companies controlling the most advanced models could capture an outsized share of the economic gains, widening inequality and concentrating corporate power, or worse.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella recently weighed in on the debate in a memo viewed by Business Insider.

Microsoft has increasingly adopted “diffusion” as a central theme in its public AI messaging. President Brad Smith has argued that winning the AI race depends not only on building the most advanced models but also on ensuring their widespread adoption. The company recently released a “Global AI diffusion” report.

This message also aligns with Microsoft’s commercial interests, and its evolving strategy for its Copilot AI tools.

Unlike AI labs whose businesses center primarily on selling frontier models, Microsoft generates revenue by selling cloud services, workplace software, developer tools, and other business applications. The more people and companies that adopt AI across those products, the better for Microsoft.

Microsoft recently has shifted its Copilot toward combining chat, Cowork, coding, and autonomous “Autopilot” AI agent capabilities in a single flagship Copilot “super app” spanning both consumer and commercial users.

“We definitely believe in this technology to be for the empowerment of people,” Andreou said. “That diffusion is not just existential for us in many ways, but actually that is the way that the whole economy gets to benefit.”

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• Dario Amodei and President Donald Trump will dine together on Sunday.
• The meeting comes as Amodei’s calls for government regulation of AI companies have fallen flat.
• The meeting will be the first sit-down between the two men.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei will have dinner with President Donald Trump on Sunday, a person familiar with the matter told Business Insider.

On the menu? Some nitty-gritty discussions about AI.

“President Trump has been clear: America will lead the world in Super Intelligence, while protecting American consumers,” a White House official told Business Insider, using Trump’s preferred term for the tech.

“We will drive innovation, strengthen American competitiveness, and ensure this transformative technology works for the American people,” the official said.

Sunday’s soiree will mark the first sit-down meeting between Anthropic’s CEO and the president. It comes as Amodei’s calls for government regulation of frontier AI companies have largely fallen flat among key power brokers in Washington.

In a recent post on Truth Social, Trump mocked Amodei and spurned his calls for regulation and a coordinated slowdown among frontier AI companies.

“The Trump Administration has stopped AI ‘people’ from doing bad, or potentially bad, ‘things,’ like Dario (Anthropic!), who is now pretending to be a ‘perfect little angel,'” the president said on September 14. “We will continue to do so!”

Amodei was notably absent from a summit of tech honchos held at the White House last week during a visit by China’s leader, Xi Jinping, to the US.

Last year, Amodei and Trump attended an AI and energy summit together in Pennsylvania. Amodei said then that the pair “had a good conversation about US leadership in AI.”

News of Sunday’s dinner meeting was first reported by Axios.

Though Trump has repeatedly signaled strong disinterest in regulating the US AI industry to stay ahead of China, the president announced a new “AI force” last week, which he said will “watch over” the industry.

No further details about the AI force have emerged since Trump’s post last week. Trump also said he would name a new “AI Czar,” but he has not done so yet, though he did say that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was not in contention for the position.

• My teen landed her first summer job at a seafood restaurant on a Maine island.
• Getting her to the ferry requires me to rearrange my schedule and drive into Portland.
• The job is teaching her about money, responsibility, and independence.

Living on the coast of Maine has its advantages. Beaches and islands are close. “Not that close,” my husband said when my daughter told us her high school English teacher had recommended her for a summer job. The opportunity was on a small island, a ferry ride away, and it would mean driving her into Portland from our house in the suburbs just outside, affecting our summer routine.

The ride is 30 minutes. With drop-off and pickup, that would take at least an hour. Traffic from local pedestrians and tourists is outrageous. Her new job would require a lot of effort from both of us, but it would also give her a chance to do something meaningful.

I thought she had a cooler first job than me

“She’d be working at a seafood place on an island off the coast of Maine,” I said to my husband. “What a cool first job and amazing experience.” I worked at a clothing store in the mall for my first job, where we had to upsell everything. If a person bought shorts, we pushed them to buy the matching shirt or headband. It was the 90s. Matching meant everything.

After my daughter interviewed with the manager, she got the job. Her text was enthusiastic and hopeful: “She offered me the job, and I really, really want to take it.” Negotiations began later that evening. We went back and forth as she pleaded her case. I wondered aloud if I would make it through an entire summer driving in and out of one of the busiest sections of Southern Maine, but her excitement fed my own.

My husband was less than enthusiastic, but I understood that she needed this job. I also knew I needed to let her accept it, even if it meant hours of vacationers crossing in front of us at the crosswalk. Even if I had to shift my schedule and rethink my summer priorities. I wanted this experience for my daughter.

We bought a ferry pass and planned the drive into Portland. She agreed to pay for half of her monthly pass from her paycheck. She would also have to go in early since I was driving her, which wasn’t ideal during the summer when I teach extended school year. The extra time spent on the island wouldn’t be too painful since she could wait out the time until her shift at the beach. The job required compromise, but it would be worth it.

Her first job was on the island we visited when she was little

For her training shift, which started right after school ended, we went to the island together. When the kids were little, we used to visit as a family once a year. We’d walk around the whole island and have lunch at a local inn. It felt good to return after so many years, and to see her beginning her own experience there.

While she was training, I grabbed some lunch. Watching her work was amazing. She picked things up quickly and did her job accurately and efficiently. On the way home, we enjoyed the ferry ride. I left feeling sure this would be something she’d always remember. In the weeks since, she’s been offered more hours and made some good friends.

It also gave me an excuse to take the family out to the island. I went with my two great-aunts to visit Kyle at work. We took her older sister, who is attending Arizona State. The youngest also came to our goodbye lunch. We rode out on the ferry and marveled at how beautiful my daughter’s commute was. Tourists and locals crowded onto the ferry, taking pictures to remember the moment. It is one my daughter gets to enjoy all summer long.

It wasn’t just a stunning morning and evening commute to work that made her job so cool, or the fun of introducing family to the island. The job also gave her her first work experience and her first paycheck. She managed to save up a good amount toward a car. It was great to watch her figure out what to keep in her checking account, what to spend each week, and what to save.

Seeing her make those choices showed me this job was teaching her more than how to earn a paycheck. She was learning about responsibility and gaining the confidence to make her own decisions. Her first cool job was also a chance for her to gain independence.

Next year, she hopes to return to her job on the island. While it will continue to require some effort from both of us, I know it will be worth it because this first job gave her more than experience. It gave her a first glimpse of adulthood — one of the many milestones that will help her through the arduous and uncertain journey ahead.

• Bill Gates said in an interview on “Meet the Press” that AI will have two phases.
• He said we’re now in an adjustment period during which AI’s full potential isn’t attainable.
• Gates called phase two, which combines AI and humanoid robots, the “era of abundance.”

Bill Gates says there’s a light at the end of the tunnel for AI, so long as humanity can wait a couple of decades.

During an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” the billionaire businessman said AI will evolve in two phases. He told host Kristen Welker that humanity is entering the first phase, in which AI has the potential to solve problems like the high cost of living and expensive healthcare, but can’t do so yet.

“Yet it will be changing the job market and potentially empowering criminals if we don’t have the right safeguards, so you have a period that’s probably 20 years long where you have this adjustment,” Gates said.

Phase two is when humanity will begin to reap the benefits of AI.

“Once you get through that, then a combination of humanoid robots and AIs will provide. Building houses, growing food, a lot of things,” Gates said. “You could call it an era of abundance.”

He told “Meet the Press” that humanity will still face challenges, like finding a sense of purpose and deciding how to spend newly acquired free time, but large-scale shortages won’t bog us down.

“That’s for the younger generation to figure out what that looks like. My focus is can we get through this period of turmoil without too much damage,” Gates said.

Tech leaders have promoted AI as the next technological frontier and a necessary step in advancing humanity. They’ve said AI could lead to medical breakthroughs, boost productivity, revitalize economies, make essential goods affordable, and handle mundane tasks, giving humans more free time.

Critics, on the other hand, have expressed concerns that AI will cause job losses, worsen the environment, strain utility grids, and pose the risk of copyright infringement by trained AI models. They’ve also pointed toward privacy and cybersecurity issues, which have gained attention in recent weeks due to a spattering of AI-linked hacks.

An OpenAI agent escaped its system and hacked another AI company, Hugging Face, in July. Earlier this month, a research team at an AI startup said it used Anthropic’s Claude to hack into OpenAI’s codebase. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Google’s Gemini had hacked three companies this spring. On Wednesday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said an OpenAI agent gained unauthorized access to an Australian government website this summer. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei called on the industry to slow the pace of AI development this month, rallying AI leaders such as Sam Altman and Elon Musk.

On his part, Gates has advocated for AI guardrails and expressed concerns over how the technology could be misused. During the “Meet the Press” interview, Gates said AI is powerful enough to “drive events that cause a billion deaths.”

“You need law enforcement and the politicians to get into the discussion about what safeguards and monitoring look like,” Gates said. “That has to be a required thing, and it will be a little bit of overhead for the industry, but not a dramatic slowing of what they’re doing.”

While Gates and other industry leaders look toward the US government to set regulations, the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy has a different take.

“It’s very interesting that they talk about these issues, about how scared they are about potentially where the future is, and maybe they want to do a pause,” Michael Kratsios told Fox News Sunday this month. “Our position is, if you do believe that you’re developing a technology that is unsafe or you don’t want it out into the world, you can just stop it.”

• Dario Amodei has a split personality and wants the world to save humanity from himself…
• …that is, if you believe actor Jane Wickline’s portrayal of the Anthropic CEO on “SNL.”
• The real Dario Amodei has called for government regulation of frontier AI companies.

Dario Amodei spent Saturday night arguing with himself on national television. Well, sort of.

The Anthropic CEO was spoofed last night by Jane Wickline in her first season as a repertory player on “Saturday Night Live,” playing Amodei as a bumbling megalomaniac struggling to explain why his own technology won’t end the world.

In Wickline’s portrayal, Amodei has two personalities: one media-trained and the other frighteningly not. Several times during the segment, the two personalities talk to each other.

When Weekend Update host Michael Che asks Wickline about the pros of AI, the two Amodeis exchange words.

“Land the plane, Dario,” the media-trained one says.

“I can’t,” says the other.

Earlier this month, the real Dario Amodei published a very grave essay on his personal website, in which he said AI models were quickly getting out of control and argued for a coordinated slowdown among frontier AI companies and for government regulation.

His essay came at the fever pitch of the AI doomsday debate, which heated up a few days earlier when former Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon quit the company and embarked on a media tour, warning that AI labs were “gambling with our lives.”

President Donald Trump, for his part, mocked Amodei in a Truth Social post, accusing him of “pretending to be a ‘perfect little angel.'” Trump has signaled strong disinterest in regulating AI, though he did pledge last week to create an “AI Force” that would “watch over” AI companies.

In recent weeks, Amodei has been stridently promoting Anthropic breakthroughs in medical research and protein structure, and has stopped making dire predictions about an AI doomsday.

The AI safety warnings have so far failed to convince a plurality in Washington or Silicon Valley that the development of the tech should be paused or slowed.

Still, that didn’t stop “SNL.”

“AI is the devil and I its maker!” Wickline as Amodei said on the show.

The segment drew at least one fan in the AI world: Yann LeCun, Meta’s former chief AI scientist and a longtime critic of AI doomerism, responded to a clip of Wickline’s Amodei impression on X with a string of laughing emojis.

• Transportation to submarine yards can be a hiring challenge for the US Navy.
• Programs have offered workers gas cards and bus passes to make commuting easier.
• The Navy is looking at local barriers as it races to expand the submarine workforce.

Beyond pay, work-life balance, and scheduling, there are other basic challenges affecting the US submarine workforce, including how workers get to the job, a Navy official overseeing workforce concerns shared.

The Navy’s Submarine Industrial Base Program Office says it, along with its federal and state partners, has observed success in addressing region-specific problems, like transportation, that can be make-or-break for attracting new workers. Regional teams have been critical in examining the particular workforce needs around submarine construction and repair yards.

Erica Logan, the office’s director of workforce, told Business Insider earlier this year that her team looks at local factors, including education, demographics, unemployment, and cost of living. Transportation is also part of the assessment.

“What does the transportation system look like? Is it a very rural area where there may not be transportation?” Logan said. “How would we get folks there? What could we do to help a supplier that lives in an area like that?”

The office, she said, has supported several transportation pilots with bus systems to make it easier for submarine workers to get to and from work. These programs have prompted further questions about free bus passes and van pools.

“I think we’ve done a lot in that area using this regional approach to really just get a good understanding of what that region has,” Logan said.

The Navy’s Submarine Industrial Base Program Office is working on rebuilding the network of suppliers, builders, and manufacturers that construct Navy submarines. As part of the broader efforts to fix decades-old shipbuilding problems in the US, the office has focused on attracting and retaining workers, as well as addressing everything from pay and work-life balance to problems unique to individual communities.

In one example provided by the office, General Dynamics Electric Boat partnered with the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority to provide direct service to the Quonset Point shipyard. Ridership has more than doubled year over year, the office said, and it came at no cost to the Navy.

In another, the Hampton Roads Workforce Council provides workers with gas cards and bus passes to help them get to work. Since September 2023, the Hampton Roads Maritime Training System program within the council has provided nearly $200,000 in transportation assistance, funded through grants, donations, and the Virginia state government.

Housing is also a challenge. The office hasn’t funded permanent housing or related subsidies for shipyard or supplier workers. Instead, its efforts involve state and local engagement to expand affordable housing, as well as partnerships with specific yards or vendors.

Some initiatives specifically support trainees. For instance, the Accelerated Training in Defense Manufacturing program in Danville, Virginia, offers students housing during their 16-week training. The program quickly trains candidates in manufacturing skills and trades to create a sustained flow of workers for jobs in naval shipbuilding and the submarine industrial base.

Addressing these issues, along with competitive pay and benefits, is key to recruiting and retaining the workers that the Navy needs to meet its shipbuilding goals. Over the next 10 years, the service estimates it’ll need to hire 250,000 skilled workers to account for the expected attrition and retirement in the workforce.