Black Eyed Peas co-founder is teaching a class – on AI : NPR
Pop star turned Arizona State University professor Will.i.am teaches “The Agent Self” at his headquarters in Los Angeles, California on January 14, 2026.
Emily Choi/For information.AI
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Emily Choi/For information.AI
The Black Eyed Peas spoke to a generation in the 2000s with songs like “I Gotta Feeling,” “Let’s Get it Started” and “Where is the Love?”
Lately, however, co-founder William.i.am has been speaking to a new generation – literally – with his weekly three-hour show. course for Arizona State University on the theme of “agentic AI”.
Either teleported to the screens of Arizona State’s main campus or directly with him in the lecture hall he built as part of his Los Angeles shopping complex, the approximately 80 students enrolled in William’s class are each attempting to build their own AI agent – a software system capable of performing tasks autonomously, without requiring human intervention.
The art of sustainability
As someone who has long projected a forward-thinking image of technology — it was William who coined the much-quoted lyric, “I’m so 3008. You’re so 2000 and late” from the Peas’ 2009 song “Boom Boom Pow” — the pop star turned philanthropist, entrepreneur and educator is now working to equip young people for a job market that’s being reshaped by technology.
“You’re a business, Dave. You’re not just a creative guy,” William said during a recent class, sounding more like a motivational coach than a college professor as he addressed the individuals sitting in the stands around him. “You are a business – Claudia – Karen.”
Students told NPR that they benefit a lot from William’s approach.
“Not everyone who walks into this class has a technology background,” said undergraduate Ren Flint. “He managed to break down AI and make it accessible to everyone.”
“Some people might think what he’s talking about is weird,” said graduate student Luke Azariah. “But this guy keeps a lot of us going.”
Realizing crazy ideas with technology
In an interview with NPR hours before the class, will.i.am said that humans can’t hope to compete with AI unless they are hyper-creative.
Members of the Black Eyed Peas – apl.de.ap, Fergie, Taboo and will.i.am – at the 2011 iHeartRadio Music Festival in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Isaac Brekken/Getty
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Isaac Brekken/Getty
“This is the best time to dream and realize concepts that have not yet been realized,” he said.
Realizing crazy ideas with technology is essentially what will.i.am has been doing for most of his life. Born William Adams in 1975 in a working-class neighborhood in Los Angeles, will.i.am said he was 12 and experimenting with stage names — his first nickname was “Will Chill” — when he took his sister’s. Barbie and the Rockers cassette, recorded his own rap loops on it, then played the mix back through his sister’s cassette-powered Teddy Ruxpin animatronic teddy bear.
“My sister was upset,” William remembers.
The musician and entrepreneur said there is a direct link between this first experience and “MÖFO” – or “Modular Omni Function Operator” – the AI agent-powered teddy bear he developed in partnership with Qualcomm and showed himself at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The agent is not a toy, will.i.am said, but aims to improve productivity and learning. But he said the cute exterior helps humanize the AI.
Anticipate the “boom boom pow”
It is too early to say whether “MÖFO” will take off. But man seems to have the gift of predicting the technological innovations most likely to go “boom boom pow”.
Take AI music.
It became big news over the last two years. But William was using it more than ten years ago, as the music shows. video for the 2010 Black Eyed Peas song “Imma Be Rocking That Body”.
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“I just type the lyrics. And then this thing sings it, says it, raps it, talks about it,” he tells his bandmates in the video.
Singer Fergie is visibly upset.
“We are not robots!” she exclaims before storming out of the room. Then the music begins, accompanied in part by images of friendly, dancing robots.
Competing interests?
Today, the cultural backlash against AI and AI music is widespread. So William spends a lot of time in his class at Arizona State discussing ethics and responsibility. A video shown during the course warns of the risks: “You’ve seen how corporate agents are used. You’ve seen what happens without guardrails.”
Yet will.i.am has also embraced enterprise technology. He invests in AI companies like Anthropic and OpenAIas well as the AI music creation platform Audioand joined forces with Apple, Intel And Nvidiaamong other Silicon Valley giants.
“He was a great brand ambassador,” said Deborah Conrad, a former marketing executive at Intel who hired William as the company’s director. Director of Creative Innovation in 2011.
Intel’s Deborah Conrad and William are on stage to announce his appointment as director of creative innovation in January 2011 at the company’s international sales and marketing conference.
Courtesy of Deborah Conrad
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Courtesy of Deborah Conrad
Technical journalist Brian Marchand said it was difficult to reconcile these seemingly competing interests.
“The line between passion for technology, passion for the idea that it could improve people’s lives, and just expanding one’s portfolio of markets and one’s importance as a pop culture icon, becomes quite blurry,” Merchant said. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s not sincere in his goal of trying to find a way to make AI work.”
will.i.am isn’t the only high-profile musician to have ventured into the world of technology. He co-founded Beats Electronics with Dr. Dre (and record industry executive Jimmy Iovine), which was sold to Apple in 2014 as part of a deal that also included Beats Music for $3 billion. Nas, Snoop Dogg, Brian Eno And Justin Bieber have also invested heavily in technology.
Nate Sloan, assistant professor of musicology at the University of Southern California and co-host of the podcast Pop litsaid William.i.am stands out from the crowd. “Willi.am has made it more of a part of his identity and an integral part of his career than anyone I can think of,” he said.
Alongside all this, William’s musical career continues. The Black Eyed Peas go abroad tour in June. Beyond his work with the Peas, will.i.am also released the anti-ICE anthem “East Los Angeles” last year, even though it’s been a few years since he released a hit single or album as solo artist or with the band.
A prototype of “Trinity” on display at William’s Shopping Complex in April 2026. The three-wheeled electric vehicle is equipped with an agentic AI system to help increase productivity while driving.
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He seems more focused these days on his entrepreneurial and educational pursuits. Among other projects, he is developing a car with an AI agent. And he said he hopes to teach a second semester at Arizona State.
“The joys of making music and singing on stage, we will always do,” William said. “But teaching is a different calling. It’s only the first year, and it’s great.”
