As Google continues to expand upon its ventures into artificial intelligence, it’s looking for new sources of data to train its language- and machine-learning models. Without relevant, accurate information, AI tools immediately lose their value. That being said, not everyone is ready to consent to companies like Google using their data forAI training. Now, new reports have confirmed one entity that is stepping up to meet the tech giant’s needs.

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Earlier this week, a report said that an “unnamed large AI company” had come to an agreement with Reddit to access its application programming interface (API) for the purposes of training its AI models. Earlier today,Reuters reportedthat company was none other than Google, and nowGoogle has confirmedthat it has reached an agreement with the social media aggregator.

The initials ‘AI’ against a light gray background with the Android Police logo visible

Reddit’s API provides access to its wealth of user-submitted comments and posts, and was famously at the heart ofcontroversial changes in 2023that led to the death of many third-party Reddit apps. The company’s CEO said at the time that Reddit recognized the value of this data, but that it didn’t “need to give all of that value to some of the largest companies in the world for free.”

Reddit, which is expected to go public in the near future, has an estimated value of about $10 billion. It could sell up to 10% of its shares when it goes public, and industry insiders have speculated that this initial public offering (IPO) could happen as soon as next month.

A blue background with the Reddit logo, which features a white alien head. However, in this version, the alien’s face is shown with a sad expression, with its eyes semi-closed and mouth turned down.

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For a company that hasfound itself in a bit of an AI-related scandal this week, with its Gemini model generating inaccurate depictions of historical figures with racially insensitive undertones, opting to train AI on Reddit submissions could present new problems. While generally more tame than a site like 4chan, Reddit comment sections are definitely capable of getting controversial, to say the least. It will be interesting to see if Google can take advantage of this new data stream without letting its AI parrot some of the more toxic takes out there.