The Download: the Kids issue arrives, and Bill Gates reveals his AI fears

Bill Gates reveals his AI fears">

This is today’s edition of The Download , our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.

If the desire to limit kids’ use of technology was once a subcurrent, it has become a raging flood. Countries around the world are banning children from social media. Schools across the US are ditching iPads and Chromebooks for actual books. Kids themselves seem to be embracing this tech skepticism too: the hottest gadget for Gen Alpha is a vintage Sony Walkman.

A surprising—maybe troubling—number of people who work in big tech also keep their kids at arm’s distance from technology. They lock down their phones, if they have phones at all, and keep them off social media. Hell, even Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t publicly post his children’s faces on Facebook or Instagram.

Yet there is no hiding from technology. It permeates nearly everything, everywhere. We have to prepare our children to live in the actual world we have actually created, not the one we wish we had. How can we help kids survive and thrive in what we have wrought?

That’s what the new Kids issue of MIT Technology Review is all about. With the help of the editors of Anyway , a fantastic magazine for teens and tweens, we explore how young people really feel about AI , the support networks helping kids through the polycrisis , and what happens when a child’s robot best friend dies .

We also ask why kids outlearn AI , whether monitoring apps are really keeping children safe online , how schools can encourage smarter AI use , and what happens when technology begins to reshape childhood itself, courtesy of exclusive new fiction from author and AI ethicist Jenny Williams.

Together, these stories examine how childhood is changing in an age of AI—and how we can help kids navigate the world we’ve made. Subscribe now to read the print issue in full.

It’s a glorious day in Kirkland, Washington, an affluent Seattle suburb on the eastern shore of Lake Washington. The temperature is in the mid-80s, the sky is incapable of being any more blue, and the view is gorgeous. And vaguely terrifying.

Because if the scene is placid, the messenger is not. Seated across from me at a conference room table, Bill Gates is rocking back and forth in his chair. And the more he has to say—about the threats of terror or economic collapse or just losing control of our AI systems—the more agitated I find myself becoming, too.

The philanthropist and former Microsoft CEO says he has been growing increasingly alarmed by the rate at which AI technology is advancing, especially since guardrails are not keeping pace.