SPECIAL REPORT: In the room where A.I. happened

In Silicon Valley in 2016, a group of A.I. whizzes and venture capitalists met to plot how to “replace all the writers." I was there

Nine years ago, I managed to get into a space normally sealed off to the world: the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. I wanted to understand this phenomenon that was supposed to change everything. I reported on a meeting among A.I. researchers and venture capitalists looking for the Next Big Thing. As it happened, the topic of their discussio…