A few weeks ago, Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak managed to mention AI in his commencement speech to the Grand Valley State University class of 2026—without receiving a wave of boos from the crowd.
“You all have AI—actual intelligence,” Wozniak said, eliciting applause from the audience. “My entire life in the technical world, I’ve been following people that were trying to figure out how to make a brain.”
“I was at a company where the engineers figured out how to make a brain,” he continued, saying it “takes nine months.”
For new college grads who are entering an unsteady job market with fewer openings for entry-level positions, Wozniak’s words probably felt like the most reassuring message they’ve heard all spring.
Compared to other tech moguls, Wozniak’s views on AI have been less complimentary.
“I don’t use AI much at all,” Wozniak said during a March interview with CNN. “I often read things [AI produces], and they just sound too dry and too perfect. I want something from a human being, and I’m disappointed a lot.”
On the other hand, several commencement speakers have been booed for their comments promoting AI as revolutionary.
At the University of Central Florida on May 8, humanities department commencement speaker Gloria Caulfield, vice president of strategic alliances at Tavistock Development Co., was booed after touting AI as the “next industrial revolution.”
Last Friday, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt was also booed during his graduation speech at the University of Arizona after he compared AI to the transformative impact of computers.
In Arizona on May 15, during the Glendale Community College commencement, an AI system used to read graduating students’ names missed hundreds of students’ names. Leaders of the university were booed after the technical difficulties. “We’re using a new AI system as our reader,” said the school’s president, Tiffany Hernandez, while the crowd booed. “That is a lesson learned for us.”
By contrast, Nvidia’s CEO Jensen Huang told students at Carnegie Mellon University: “Run, don’t walk” toward AI. His speech about the “AI revolution” landed more positively with students graduating from the university known as the birthplace of AI.
Delta’s CEO Ed Bastian told Emory University students that he asked AI to write his commencement address out of curiosity, but trashed it after noticing “the lack of soul nor warmth it conveyed.” “So, don’t worry,” Bastian told the crowd. “I threw it away, and took pencil to paper.”
Future commencement speakers should be taking notes.
