6th Annual Ethics & Technology Forum with special guest speaker Karen Hao

About the Talk

This year, the Ethics & Technology Forum returns to the topic of AI, and we are very pleased to welcome Karen Hao, a Silicon Valley engineer-turned-award-winning-journalist, who recently wrote the New York Times bestseller Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI (Penguin, 2025).

Her book is the culmination of many years of insider access to OpenAI as well as the AI industry more generally, and illustrates how the social, ideological and personal shape the development of new technology like AI. She shows us just how thoroughly AI will alter society, and, more importantly, what role we can all play in actively shaping AI so that it benefits are widespread. “Excellent and deeply reported” (The New York Times), Empire of AI is a page-turning thriller, and a “heroic work” by Shoshana Zuboff (The Age of Surveillance Capitalism). It is the jaw-dropping story of ambition and ego, hype and speculation, plunder and destruction, politics and labor, and, of course, money and power—a brilliant and deeply necessary look at the industry defining our era, and what the future holds.

About Karen Hao

Called “one of the foremost tech journalists covering AI” by Dr. Joy Buolamwini, Karen Hao writes for publications like The Atlantic and leads the Pulitzer Center’s AI Spotlight Series, which trains journalists around the world on how to cover artificial intelligence.
Karen was formerly a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, covering American and Chinese tech companies, and a senior editor for AI at MIT Technology Review. Her work has been cited by Congress, featured in university curriculums, and remade into museum exhibits. She has won numerous accolades, including an American Humanist Media Award and a National Magazine Award for Journalists Under 30. Karen also sits on the AI advisory board of the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. Prior to journalism, she was an application engineer at the first startup to spin out of Google, and she received a B.S. in mechanical engineering and minor in energy studies from MIT.

About the Ethics & Technology Forum

As New York evolves to become a major tech hub, and more students seek employment in technology companies, the School of Information must not only teach the knowledge and skills students need, but also imbue students with an ability to be critical, reflective, and thoughtful about their role and their employers’ roles in the world. The annual School of Information Ethics and Technology Forum brings thought leaders to discuss the most pressing issues on this topic with the Pratt Institute community. Past speakers include Samuel Woolley, Meredith Broussard, Tim Wu, Sherry Turkle and Cliff Kuang.

Welcome By

Anthony Cocciolo, Dean of the School of Information at Pratt Institute.

Introduced By

Frances Bronet is the 12th President of Pratt Institute.

Talk followed by wine and hors d'oeuvre reception.

Host or Publisher Pratt Institute School of Information