Why Google Bid $10 Million for a Failed Airline’s Data
The Spirit Airlines deal points to AI companies’ growing ambitions to automate white-collar work.
Google secured a $10 million bid for Spirit Airlines' data after it ceased operations in May. The winning bid surpassed a $7.5 million offer from AI data firm Mercor. The data set consists of 100 million emails, 500 million Microsoft Teams messages, and approximately 30 million lines of code. Google's acquisition of the data is aimed at enhancing its AI models, particularly those focusing on white-collar work.
This type of data, however, is typically private and buried within corporate emails and chats. The primary challenge in utilizing such data for AI training lies in its inherent fuzziness, making it difficult to determine whether the results are accurate. Nevertheless, companies like Surge and Mercor employ human experts to convert raw data into a usable format.
The data's usefulness relies on the quality of the information it contains, which could potentially impact the labor market by automating various jobs. Despite a union of flight attendants objecting to the data collection, Google assured that the personal information would be rigorously scrubbed before sharing, ensuring the privacy of individuals.
The outcome of the auction has sparked speculation about the AI industry's pursuit of white-collar work automation.
Written by urgent.news from Time's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
