technology, used in its search business, as well
as those developed by others.
Besides flagging the potential dangers of bias,
the paper also cited the environmental cost of
chugging so much energy to run the models
— an important issue at a company that brags
about its commitment to being carbon neutral
since 2007 as it strives to become even greener.
Google managers had concerns about omissions
in the work and its timing, and wanted the
names of Google employees taken off the study,
but Gebru objected, according to an exchange
of emails shared with the AP and first published
by Platformer.
Jeff Dean, Google’s chief of AI research,
reiterated Google’s position about the study in
a statement.
The paper raised valid points but “had some
important gaps that prevented us from being
comfortable putting Google affiliation on it,”
Dean wrote.
“For example, it didn’t include important
findings on how models can be made
more efficient and actually reduce overall
environmental impact, and it didn’t take into
account some recent work at Google and
elsewhere on mitigating bias,” Dean added.
Gebru vented her frustrations about the process
to an internal diversity-and-inclusion email
group at Google, with the subject line: “Silencing
Marginalized Voices in Every Way Possible.”
Gebru said on Twitter that’s the email that got
her fired.
Dean, in an email to employees, said the
company accepted “her decision to resign from