I was honoured to give this talk at OSS Summit Amsterdam 2025; thanks to Automattic for the opportunity to represent the company.
Tim Berners-Lee recently asked the defining question of our time: “Who Does AI Work For?”
As AI systems move from our screens into our physical world—controlling our cars, homes, and cities—this question becomes urgently personal. When your insurance robot has to choose who to save, whose interests will it prioritize?
This talk chronicles my search for answers in familiar territory: Bitcoin’s decentralization, open source reliability culture, and alternative economic models. Each promising path led to the same uncomfortable conclusion: our traditional technical approaches are fundamentally inadequate for governing AI systems that exhibit emergent, unpredictable behaviors. The breakthrough came from an unexpected direction. Drawing on neuroscience research, contemplative traditions, and historical examples from urban planning to business, I discovered that the problem isn’t technical—it’s fundamentally about our relationship to technology itself. AI systems reflect and amplify our own collective patterns in ways we’re only beginning to understand.
Through personal stories and compelling evidence, this talk reveals why every major technological crisis has been solved not by more technology, but by humans stepping back and changing how they engage with their tools. The most sophisticated AI governance strategy might be surprisingly simple and deeply personal. The talk concludes with practical frameworks for both individual developers and the broader open source community, showing how we can build technology that genuinely serves human flourishing rather than abstract optimization metrics.
I hope this resonates with you! Personally I can’t wait to have robots that work for me 🙂 Beep boop 🤖