Marc Benioff calls social media a warm-up for AI and urges industry responsibility
Chief executive of Salesforce hosting and interviewing at his company's conference
“I hope that we will take those lessons and say that social media is probably just the warm-up for AI. … Let’s hold ourselves responsible as an industry and as executives to make sure that our technology is safe and does the right thing.”
Source and context
Reporting
About this source
Politico report datelined San Francisco, timestamped 5:27 PM ET on September 15, 2026 and updated at 7:08 PM. Covers the Dreamforce megaconference hosted by Marc Benioff, at which Huang, Amodei and Altman each spoke.
Before the quotation
Benioff made the remarks during a question-and-answer session between his interviews with Amodei and Altman, saying the industry is in a very fluid moment.
After the quotation
He also said companies and technology executives must be held responsible for the technology they build. The ellipsis marks intervening narration by the reporters.
How this statement is classified
Case context: Should Washington impose stronger safeguards on frontier AI?
The label describes this statement’s response within the context above.
Why this label?
Benioff says companies must be held responsible and should follow existing laws, but places the pace of development with companies rather than government. He neither endorses nor rejects new federal safeguards, so the label is mixed.
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Should Washington impose stronger safeguards on frontier AI?
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