upvote
I can't tell from the site or the linked twitter handles. Their core ask for every state seems to be "Please support clear safe-harbor language for lawful local AI ownership, research, model modification, open-source publication, and local execution" rather than stopping or amending any specific bill/law.

One they _could_ be referring to is the California AI Transparency Act which isn't compatible with open source licensing, see https://github.blog/news-insights/policy-news-and-insights/g...

reply
It might just mean "please oppose the inevitable attempts to privatize AI governance".

Nothing has ever been, directly or indirectly, deficit financed at this scale before. In notional or real terms, in history, by anyone.

Now maybe there's an argument that it's a good investment: we are going to beggar the Treasury to buy 2CTA on CoWoS out of Taipei and DCs the size of Manhattan. I personally think we could have done a little more engineering before deciding that the big blind was like, 5 trillion all counted, but it was going to be expensive no matter what.

What super weird is that we're running a project where the "penny" to the "dollar" is the Manhattan Project, and a couple of super weird dudes who do MDMA at Lighthaven now and again are like, in charge of it.

reply
> we are going to beggar the Treasury to buy 2CTA on CoWoS out of Taipei and DCs the size of Manhattan

what does this mean?

reply
>2CTA

Dunno.

>CoWoS

Chip on wafer on substrate

>DCs

Data centers

reply
Cooperative Thread Array
reply
at some point the amount of money dumped into it will either result in a total monopoly with everything local banned or an economic collapse
reply
> Nothing has ever been, directly or indirectly, deficit financed at this scale before. In notional or real terms, in history, by anyone.

I find it unlikely that this is true.

The obvious candidate for things financed through staggeringly large deficits would be war.

reply
True because wars finance value destruction.

But with $1.4T announced capex for the Frontier AI labs, we're not far from the 2nd (illegal) war in Irak: $1.8T of direct military spending.

With that said, I don't know how Frontier Ai companies will ever recover this capex with a glorious $50B of revenues. Add to that that a GPU's lifetime is only a few years and you may see it as a deadend.

NB: did you know Uber destroyed $27B of value since inception? But it still exists. So Frontier AI might just do the same.

reply
deleted
reply
[dead]
reply
[flagged]
reply
The EU did not ban 8K TV’s, this is a very misleading spin. They put energy consumption restrictions some TV’s violated years ago. Manufacturers have already responded with more efficient TV’s, which actually means the restriction is working as intended towards a good outcome IMO. You can absolutely buy 8K TV’s in Europe.

No EU country has banned air conditioning either.

Where are you getting this information?

reply
[flagged]
reply
A ban on desktop PC components over a certain power threshold (300W) or PSUs would definitely affect local AI, and Europe is not a big enough market, nor has it's own internal supply chains to offer alternatives.

This has been done in the EU/UK in the past (hoovers/vacuum cleaners) so the mechanism exists.

I'm in the UK and support your direction.

reply
> would definitely affect local AI

And not only. Given your example with 300W, it will affect even things like (somewhat advanced) home servers, (mostly) personal self-hosting machines and even just gaming PCs. That would affect way too much, if I understood your thought correctly.

reply
Those people seem to have installed multiple outdoor units, there are limited numbers you are allowed to do without getting planning permission (two for detached housing, one for semi, nothing by default for flats) because these things have impacts on those nearby.

The telegraph is an awful rag, and should be read assuming the facts are probably true as written but interpreted in an incredibly biased way.

reply
So you are only allowed to use goverment approved models for local LLM, of reasonable size (lets say 8GB vram). And gov can inspect your local data any time.

But that is not a ban on local LLMs!

reply
That’s wildly different, and if you want to invent things and then get mad at them you can, but the rules on ac are because the outside part has an impact on your neighbours.
reply
The UK did not ban AC. Don't read the Telegraph, and if you do, don't trust it.

Source: I live there

reply
Wasn't this a case of people fitting window-mounted units without realising they needed planning permission first? I'm also in the UK.
reply
I think so, or even more permanent ones. since it’s London I assume flats where you need permission for any number of outdoor units but it’s then one for semi detached and two for detached houses - one of the examples in the article is someone with three outdoor units afaict.
reply
AC is not banned in Germany, but it is unGerman to have one.
reply
I feel like that changed in the last 2-4 years, coinciding with the advent of heatpumps in Germany.
reply
The UK is not part of the EU and no EU nation - nor the UK - has banned AC. You said EU nations have banned AC when none have, this statement is false.

8K tv’s are not banned. You can buy one right now in the EU. So this statement is also false.

The telegraph is a tabloid rag full of false claims dressed up in truth they’ve taken great lengths to keep slivers of so I can’t explicitly call them “liars.” But the truth is they are functionally lying, as evidenced by your insisting something is banned that isn’t.

Unless you can point to these bans this is false information.

reply
deleted
reply
> chinese models without safety filters (it could be used to create software exploits)

Any decent coding setup can create software exploits. That bird has flown.

reply
Awkward realities never stopped a determined legislator.
reply
Here are some 8k television sets for sale within the EU:

https://www.elgiganten.se/tv-ljud-smart-hem/tv-tillbehor/tv/...

It is common for politicians and government agencies to advise lowering electricity consumption during demand peaks or apply regulation to permanent installations on the outside of homes, but it's not like stores are forbidden to sell mobile cooling units or electricity being rationed here.

Where I live most people use heat pumps for indoor climate, air-air, air-water and geothermal-water are common, and a neighbour produces heat pump collectors for use in water. In general this means we either already have cooling or can relatively cheaply install it. Some people burn wood or wood pellets for heating, it's common that they also have an air-air heat pump for cooling during summer.

reply