Genius Makers

Genius Makers by Cade Metz is a narrative history of the key figures and institutions that created modern artificial intelligence, tracing the journey from Geoffrey Hinton's neural network breakthroughs through DeepMind's AlphaGo victory and beyond. Metz examines how researchers like Yann LeCun, Yoshua Bengio, and others at universities and companies like Google, Facebook, and OpenAI transformed machine learning from an academic backwater into the foundation of contemporary AI systems. The book distinguishes itself through intimate access to these scientists and their personal stories, revealing the collaborative rivalries, funding battles, and philosophical debates that shaped the field. As a New York Times technology reporter, Metz provides insider perspective on how academic research became commercialized and how the race for AI dominance reshaped Silicon Valley and global tech competition.