“This is your brain. This is your brain on AI-driven digital media. Any questions?”
Event Name: Media Literacy Week Speaker<br>Organization: Financial Aid<br>Categories: Calendar - Master Calendar<br>Expected Headcount: 50<br>Event Locator: 2026-AATCWD<br><br><strong>“This is your brain. This is your brain on AI-driven digital media. Any questions?” Exploring the Ethics of Online Advertising, Recommender Systems, and Chatbots</strong><br>A famous public service announcement from the 1980s featured a man holding a sizzling frying pan (“This is your brain”) and cracking an egg into it (“This is your brain on drugs”), asking the viewer, “Any questions?” Of course, the message couldn’t be clearer: drugs fry your brain.<br><p>From parents to politicians to a former Surgeon General, many today would swap drugs with AI-driven digital media in this cautionary metaphor. Are they right? Does AI-driven digital media fry your brain?</p> <p>In this talk, Dr. Andrew McAninch examines some ethical questions raised by three common features of AI-driven digital media: online advertising, recommender systems, and LLM-powered chatbots. In some ways, Dr. Andrew McAninch argues, these features can indeed behave like drugs: turning users’ desires against them, locking them in vicious feedback loops, and giving them a false sense of their own insight and abilities. While drugs can be abused, though, one might argue that at least some of them (e.g., alcohol) can be used responsibly as well, at least by mature adults. Dr. Andrew McAninch suggests that the same might be true of AI-driven digital media.</p> <p><strong>Part of MSOE's 2026 Media Literacy Week</strong></p>