Google employees reportedly joked about playing drinking games and made up a song to the tune of ‘Old MacDonald’ to mock how many times execs said AI at I/O developer conference

• Google employees are reportedly happy with products revealed at the company’s annual development conference, but are still making jokes.
• CNBC cited messages and memes from internal communications mocking how often AI was mentioned.
• Some employees said they should take a shot every time AI was mentioned by a Google executive.

While Google employees are reportedly impressed with the new technology unveiled at the company’s annual I/O developer conference, some are poking fun at how often executives mentioned the two hottest words in Silicon Valley: artificial intelligence. 

As Google unveiled several new tools at the event this week, including AI assistance with writing emails quickly, employees joked internally about playing a drinking game and taking a shot every time an executive said AI, according to CNBC.

Citing messages and memes viewed on the company’s internal Memegen communication system, CNBC reported that employees were generally positive about the conference, but still made jokes like using the letters “AI-AI-I/O” to reference the tune of the classic nursery rhyme “Old MacDonald.”

The internal messaging site is often used by Google employees to make jokes at the expense of the company and executives including CEO Sundar Pichai. Earlier this year, it was used by staffers to vent frustrations about what many felt was a “rushed” showcase of Bard, Google’s answer to OpenAI’s popular ChatGPT.

The employees credited the company’s engineers during the I/O event, and a popular post pointed out that the company’s stock has risen in the days since the event because of the positive reaction to the new features, CNBC reported.

Employees also referenced a “That ’70s Show” scene with a character pouring alcohol, joking that an effective drinking game would be taking a shot every time AI is mentioned, per CNBC.

Last month, Insider reported that a group of executives including Pichai and Mark Zuckerberg said “AI” at least 168 times on their recent first quarter earnings calls.

“As someone who expected to make snarky memes the whole time, it was nice to be wowed,” one employee said in a message reported by CNBC.