OpenAI wants you to think of AI like a car. Europe invented the automobile, but strict regulations prevented its widespread use there. In laissez-faire America, the car dominated the culture. OpenAI wants the US to do it again. On Monday, the company behind ChatGPT announced AI in America: OpenAI’s Economic Planwhitepaper urging Washington to let artificial intelligence determine the country’s future.
AI in America is a an insignificant document of 15 pages with an AI-generated cover photo showing an architect’s desk overlooking a futuristic cityscape. The picture and 15 pages look good at first glance. But like so many things related to artificial intelligence, both the picture and the blueprint for economic prosperity seem vague and grotesque the more you look at them. The coffee mug in the picture has no handle. The words written on the pages of the picture look like illegible smudges. The economic blueprint contains calls to action asking the government to hand over public secrets to large private companies.
The more you look, the more things fall apart. of OpenAI Economic plan is a call for a lightly regulated AI future where government-collected data, both state secrets and public information, is fed into its vast and hungry machines.
The first thing OpenAI wants you to know is that artificial intelligence is very important and very scary. “AI is too powerful to be led and shaped by autocrats, but that’s the growing risk we face, while the economic opportunity AI presents is too compelling to pass up,” reads an opening note from OpenAI’s vice president of global affairs, Chris Lehane . “Shared prosperity is as close and measurable as the new jobs and growth(opens in new window) that will come from building more AI infrastructure such as data centers, chip factories and power plants.”
And how should America achieve such ambitious goals? Sharing as many of their secrets as possible with AI companies. “As appropriate, share self-maintained national security information and resources—such as industry security threat briefings and high-level test results of US and non-US AI models—with US AI companies conducting advanced research.” says the economic blueprint.
It goes on. OpenAI always wants the feds to share their “unique expertise with AI companies, including information on how to protect your IP from industrial security threats and mitigate potential cyber, chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear CBRN and other risks amplified by increasingly powerful models.”
And of course, there’s all that beautiful data just sitting there waiting to be scanned. “A lot of government data is in the public domain. Making it more accessible or machine-readable could help US AI developers of all sizes, especially those working in areas where vital data is disproportionately held by the government,” the draft said. “In return, developers using this data could work with the government to unlock new insights that will help it develop better public policies.”
The economic blueprint also notes that “infrastructure is destiny” and that the US is uniquely positioned to create jobs and stay ahead of China. All that needs to be done is to focus on building the infrastructure for AI systems, if not the humans. “In the era of artificial intelligence, chips, data, energy and talent are the resources that will support continued US leadership, and as with mass production of cars, channeling these resources will create broad economic opportunity and strengthen our global competitiveness,” it said. .
What does that mean? “Seize the moment and build the infrastructure needed to produce enough power and chips to drive down the price of computing and make it abundant,” it says. “In turn, this will create tens of thousands of skilled trade jobs, boost local economies through consumption and indirect job creation, and modernize our energy grid in the short term—ultimately supporting the kind of discovery and innovation that drives sustained economic growth.” “
It will work, provided AI eventually becomes as important to the long-term future of the world as OpenAI and all the other AI companies want you to believe.
OpenAI released its economic blueprint for America the same morning it was announced by the Biden White House deleting the new regulations industry. Biden’s new regulations will create a multi-tiered list of countries with which AI companies do business. At the first level are the USA and 18 of its allies. These countries are without restrictions. China and Russia are on the third level and no AI company can do business with them. The rest of the world is level 2. I can have some AI as a treat. But the White House will set limits.
“In his final days in office, the Biden administration seeks to undermine America’s leadership with a 200+ page regulatory quagmire, crafted in secret and without proper legislative review,” NVIDIA he said in a blog post on new regulations. “This comprehensive overreach would impose bureaucratic controls on the way America’s leading semiconductors, computers, systems and even software are designed and marketed globally.”
These appear to be the kinds of burdensome regulations that OpenAI railed against in its economic plan. But it’s also largely focused on countries other than the US, something Altman and OpenAI have long attempted thread the needle calling artificial intelligence a revolutionary technology that needed to be unleashed while also arguing that it was dangerous and in need of serious regulation.
But the pro-regulation Democrats are no longer in power. Everything could change in a week. Elon Musk is not a fan of Altman and OpenAI and is close to the incoming president for now. It will be interesting to see how the new president and his Musk-backed administration respond to OpenAI’s demands for looser government regulation and broad access to federal data.