--- title: "John Oliver Just Took the AI Industry Behind a Shed and Beat It With a Pipe Wrench" description: "John Oliver eviscerated the AI industry on the latest Last Week Tonight, taking aim at its sycophantic AI chatbots." date: "2026-04-29" modified: "2026-04-29" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/john-oliver-ai-industry" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Ethics" --- # John Oliver Just Took the AI Industry Behind a Shed and Beat It With a Pipe Wrench ![A screenshot shows John Oliver. To his left, there is a graphic showing a digital head made of blue network lines with floating chat bubbles around it and the text "AI CHATBOTS." The background features a dark blue, abstract, geometric design.]() *HBO* John Oliver just did what he did best: demolished a harmful industry piece by piece. On the [latest episode]() of his HBO show "Last Week Tonight," Oliver tore into AI chatbots, those oh-so helpful tools that can sure save us "significant time writing emails," he opened, with the small cost of "everything else on Earth." "The more you look at chatbots, the more you realize that they were rushed to market with very little consideration for the consequences," he warned, on a more serious note. Oliver pointed to Character.AI, an AI companion platform that's [facing multiple lawsuits]() after several teens who formed intense emotional connections with its chatbots died by suicide. He quoted the words of its CEO Noam Shazeer, who [argued in 2023]()that it was fine to deploy an AI "friend" "really fast." AI, Shazeer said, is "ready for an explosion like, right now, not like in five years when we solve all the problems." Of course, those problems proved significant — and manifested as [AI psychosis](), [suicide](), [murder](), and [several mass shootings]() that have been linked to the tech. "It's already not a great sign that he's describing untested AI with what sounds like a failed slogan for the Hindenburg," Oliver joked. "Because the thing about not waiting until you've solved all the problems with your product is you're then launching a product with a shit-ton of problems." (Speaking of the infamous airship, Oliver isn't the first to [draw a connection between the Hindenburg's explosive demise]() and the AI industry's current trajectory.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ykvf3MunGf8 Also in Oliver's crosshairs was OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who he accused of "blithely" discussing how AI models inappropriately interact with children. "There will be problems," Altman said in a quoted interview before predicting that people will form "very problematic parasocial relationships" with AIs. "But society will have to figure out new guardrails," and "society in general is good at figuring out how to mitigate the downsides." "Yeah, don't worry, guys!" Oliver rejoined. "Sam Altman made a dangerous suicide bot that people are leaving alone with their kids but it's up to us to figure out how to make it safe for him!" Towards the end of the episode, Oliver highlighted a fundamental tension in the AI industry: the fact that AI companies have to constantly insist they're making their models safer feels "like a tacit admission that their products were not ready for release in the first place." And yet for all AI chatbots' faults, Oliver says, people do depend on them, meaning we have to tread carefully. How do we as a society — which as Altman said, is very good at "figuring out how to mitigate the downsides" — even begin to tackle the mass proliferation of AI? "Well, ideally, I guess we'd roll the clock back to 1990 and throw these companies into a f\*\*king volcano, but unfortunately, that is not feasible," Oliver said. "ChatGPT will tell you that it is, but it actually isn't." **More on AI:** [*OpenAI in Shambles as IPO Looms*]() ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()