Google is afraid of assuming your gender with Gmail's Smart Compose feature

[Greg S]

Bottom line: Instead of building a better AI system or giving users a choice of suggestions, Google is removing all gender-specific terms from Gmail's Smart Compose suggestion tool over fears of backlash from easily offended users.

Earlier this year Google introduced an AI-assisted autocomplete feature on Gmail that is meant to make writing emails faster and easier. Apparently political correctness is getting in the way of improving the AI engine. Instead of analyzing profile data, names, photos, and other information passed through Gmail, Google is removing gender pronouns so as not to offend users.

Google will no longer use words such as "her" or "him" in autocomplete suggestions. According to Gmail product manager Paul Lambert, this alleged issue was brought up by a Google employee in January of this year. When writing about meeting with an investor, the AI engine suggested "Do you want to meet him?" as a potential follow-up question instead of offering the possibility that the investor could be a woman.

Currently, Google is up to around 1.5 billion Gmail users worldwide. Smart Compose is now being used on around 11 percent of emails sent through Gmail's web interface. Lambert has said that certain mistakes are far more forgivable than others, calling a mistake of gender "a big, big thing."

According to Lambert, a team of around 15 employees were tasked with removing any form of bias from Smart Compose, but ultimately were not successful in correctly determining user gender with high enough accuracy. Removal of the pronouns is said to affect less than one percent of suggestions.

Even though Google is taking the easy way out of simply removing functionality from its AI, other tech giants have done the same. On mobile devices, Apple has already removed several suggestions that could imply a gender. Microsoft and Amazon have been offering feminine words in translations whenever there is doubt. Microsoft has also removed gendered pronouns from LinkedIn's Smart Replies feature.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/77591-google-afraid-assuming-gender-gmail-smart-compose-feature.html

 

[Kibaruk]

Sometimes I hate people...

 

[Mister_K]

What, male or female? Only two genders that exist.

 

[MonsterZero]

I say man after every sentence, man.

 

[Azshadi]

Jesus effin Christ.... Idiocracy we're skyrocketing our way to you.... guess this is the other side of "democracy".....

 

[Jamlad]

Why?

What percentage of the population actually identify as non-binary, and of that small percentage how many would actually be offended by this?

 

[p51d007]

LOL, political correctness, run amok! Typical from the cesspool in San Fran.

 

[Uncle Al]

"Do you want to meet him?" What is the prefered gender? Do You want to meet it?

 

[Polycount]

"Do you want to meet him?" What is the prefered gender? Do You want to meet it?

Most likely "Do you want to meet them?" which is probably not proper English, but that seems to be the consensus among individuals who are concerned about this sort of thing.

 

[OutlawCecil]

"Do you want to meet him?" What is the prefered gender? Do You want to meet it?

No, sadly, it's "Do you want to meet... wait, what pronoun do you most identify with?" I've heard you're supposed to ask. >_<

 

[gcarter]

#snowflake generation!

 

[TheBigT42]

Jesus effin Christ.... Idiocracy we're skyrocketing our way to you.... guess this is the other side of "democracy".....

Other side of mob rule

 

[BigMack70]

Google's motto used to be "don't be evil" but maybe they should have focused on "don't be retarded" instead... what a bunch of nonsense

 

[mrjgriffin]

U ever notice transgender people look like deformed alien versions of what used to be actual human beings? I never had a problem with trans people until it became some huge epidemic and now they're wanting new genders and stuff which is retarded. "I identify as a piece of chicken drenched in man gravy on a piece of toast." these people need to be taken out until they start acting normal. seriously. they're a waste of population. just shut up and be happy that u live in a world advanced enough to change your sex. before that was possible you either hid in a shell and dressed appropriately according to the gender u were born as or you crossdressed and got called names. the world is much easier for u now so stop making such a big deal about something that you can't defeat. get over yourselves.

 

[cliffordcooley]

Flip flop that way you are correct/incorrect 50% of the time.

 

[DanielSig]

"Removal of the pronouns is said to affect less than one percent of suggestions."

In my language, one's own gender and the gender of the one being spoken to is in almost every sentence. GLHF localizing that feature.

 

[Buhaj]

1st world problems...

 

[toooooot]

Meanwhile, google is also helping china build a browser that will control every click of Chinese people. I do not respect anything google does in the name of good now. You are hypocrites. You do not care about gender equality or anything good, and it is time you stop pretending. Be evil, just be honest about it. How about you make this announcement: "We like money, we like to look good because it helps us make more money. We don't give a **** about gender equality or anything trendy now. But you stupid sheeple like us for that, and we will continue to do it while aiding dictatorships for money."