Congress is racing to regulate AI. Silicon Valley is eager to teach them how

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/06/17/congress-regulating-ai-schumer/

by robg • 3 years ago

35 44 3 years ago

api• 3 years ago

They learned from the web and the way later movers like Google upstaged early big web companies like Yahoo and AltaVista. When you have the resources to do so, go straight for regulatory capture. Outlaw competition before it can challenge you to lock in first mover advantage.

AI is the first real fundamental advance since the Internet went public. Looks like they’re trying to head it off and lock it down right away this time.

paddw• 3 years ago

I think a lot of people genuinely believe that AI can/should be regulated.

People at the companies may or may not want to do this for selfish reasons, but regardless, have been basically forced to "ask" for regulation, or face that regulation being applied against them as an existential threat to the business.

Meta seems to have possibly gotten around this through having their model "leaked", but I am not sure what else can be expected at this point. I am hopeful that community efforts will be able to make progress quickly enough so as to make regulatory capture seem more difficult.

jjtheblunt3• 3 years ago

AI is the first real fundamental advance since the Internet went public.

CRISPR-cas9 is a pretty strong competitor.

Our_Benefactors2• 3 years ago

Not even close. CRISPR is a niche science nerd topic. Whereas AI is a household conversation topic these days.

kneebonian• 3 years ago

Aka. The big Tech companies are anxious to ensure regulatory capture to prevent competition and screw over the citizenry.

linusg7892• 3 years ago

How would a proposed regulation even work? Didn't Google publish an article about how they have no moat against open source models?

nonethewiser4• 3 years ago

Well that’s easy. Kill open source models by requiring all sorts of expensive compliance from the model provider. Ta-da! Google has a moat.

flangola72• 3 years ago

It takes hundreds of millions of dollars of compute on high end low latency GPU hardware to build these models. These GPUs are manufacturered in only one or two places on earth.

linusg7892• 3 years ago

https://ghostarchive.org/archive/H8eMu

nonethewiser4• 3 years ago

As real as regulatory capture is, alternatively, do we actually want congress to make laws based off their poor understanding of what AI is and where its going?

If we get AI laws they will either be misinformed or designed to entrench the current winners. I actually dont think we need AI laws. If some real problem actually does emerge in the future which warrants a new law then we can make an informed law to deal with it then.

8note• 3 years ago

I don't think ai is different enough from the rest of software, and even creative works to warrant needing dedicated ai experts guiding congress.

It's best if congress treats it as a company paying humans to do the same work, where the humans are assumed to be copying the training artifacts to the output

nonethewiser4• 3 years ago

I don't think ai is different enough from the rest of software, and even creative works to warrant needing dedicated ai experts guiding congress.

Agree 100%. We dont need AI laws because they cut across other existing laws such as copyright, for example.

sterlind• 3 years ago

Some US Senators were already giving Meta a hard time about releasing LLaMA to researchers, saying that centralization is "safer" to control and regulate. I couldn't help but think of the "We have no moat" leak, and to think that those senators were well-informed about the business side of the emerging AI duopoly.

onos• 3 years ago

Hot take: I’d be open to laws around opt in vs opt out for what is considered available for training data.

29_292• 3 years ago

Whatever laws we come up with China won't comply. So this is like kicking ourselves in the kneecap

echelon2• 3 years ago

Oh, no no. We'll be keeping Microsoft, Google, and Meta in power. They'll be just fine. They won't have to worry about small, nimble startups coming for their lunch.

AI makes a lot of product easy to deliver, and startups can tool it in ways to go after entirely new product areas and domains. Big tech disassembly, a la Craigslist. Quickly. We can't have that until big tech gets a good choke hold via regulatory moat.

ClumsyPilot• 3 years ago

Whatever tech laws EU comes up with, US does not comply. Especially when it comes to peovacy. Now all of the sudden the shoe is in the other foot.

Also, you sont even know whay laws you want yet, and are already pointong fingers.

pwdisswordfishc• 3 years ago

There should be some law about using a spellchecker.

pixl972• 3 years ago

Eh, China will be fine with our laws for AI for internal usage, they don't want internal destabilization either. If your AI happens to become bothersome to Xi or drop out too many Pooh flavored meme's then expect China to frown on it.

Now for AI's used against other countries then China will be all about that, as long as they know their place.

user_named• 3 years ago

I haven't seen the US complying with Chinese law.

29_292• 3 years ago

exactly

heavyset_go2• 3 years ago

The laws are to keep the poors and competitors away from the resources necessary to be real competition.

lagniappe• 3 years ago

We're stuck in a tough spot: The fact is that the power structure is clueless when it comes to tech, for the most part. The other edge to that though, is that the ones capable of informing them have a financial motivation to do so.

zadokshi• 3 years ago

US Companies generally outsource ”illegal” research to other countries. there is a reason “biomedical research” occurs in Ukraine and not the US. there is a reason a certain lab in China was funded by the US to do virus research. How would this be different? It makes no sense to regulate in just one country.

Why would the US want to push this work out into other countries? i’m a little unclear about what is going on here? What are the underlying motives? Is it about votes or profits?

23B1• 3 years ago

"Congress will never understand AI. Powerful tech companies are eager to exploit that"

FTFY

echelon2• 3 years ago

Sinister hypothetical scenario:

Congress: Tell us about AI. If and how we should regulate it.

Big Tech, public hearing: AI will eat the world if not regulated. Crime will be abundant. Jobs will be lost.

Big Tech, private dinner: Our unilateral control over AI will boost our stock prices.

Congress: Only companies with regulatory checks and balances can run AI.

Also congress: Buys MSFT, GOOG, META.

andsoitis• 3 years ago

The EU also has draft legislation: https://www.wsj.com/articles/ai-regulation-is-almost-here-in...

Or: https://archive.is/2023.06.14-134908/https://www.wsj.com/amp...

roenxi2• 3 years ago

We've been seeing something of a Cambrian explosion in AI that is driven by hardware. Legislation of "AI" will not be enough. There is a chance that the low key war against general purpose computing starts to ratchet up into a big deal.

RcouF1uZ4gsC• 3 years ago

If AI is too dangerous to allow normal people to have it, it is definitely too dangerous for governments and large corporations.

pixl972• 3 years ago

I mean, that's what regulation would prevent, right?

heavyset_go2• 3 years ago

The law would let OpenAI become the Lockheed Martin of AI, while the rest of us will go to prison if we touch it.

aio2• 3 years ago

We can make up all kinds of scenarios and post them here, but that's not gonna change that this shit regulation's gonna come sooner or later.

amanaplanacanal• 3 years ago

I don’t see anything in the article talking about what kind of regulation is being proposed.

jiggawatts• 3 years ago

The moat-preserving kind.

flangola72• 3 years ago

The moat narrative is a red herring.

cyanydeez• 3 years ago

The worst outcome is AI Writing those 800 page laws that no Congress person will read.

Congress is racing to regulate AI. Silicon Valley is eager to teach them how

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