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The Internet United States

US Debates Data Policy To Avoid a Fragmented Global Internet (bloomberg.com) 23

The White House is racing to overcome internal differences and hash out a new policy over how the US and other governments should view the rapid rise of global data flows that are fueling everything from AI to advanced manufacturing. From a report: In a series of sessions due to begin on Wednesday, President Joe Biden's national security and economic teams are due to meet with companies, labor and human rights advocates, and other experts on the digital economy as part of a review launched last month, according to people directly involved. At issue is laying out a clear US position on the rules for the global internet as governments confront an accelerating amount of data flowing across borders with mounting economic, privacy, income inequality and national security consequences.

Coming just days after the EU agreed late Friday to new regulations for AI, the Biden administration's push highlights how governments are racing to figure out their role in a fast-evolving digital economy and competing to lead the conversation. [...] In an interview, a senior administration official said the US was not backing away from long-standing US advocacy for a free and open internet even as some governments around the world are increasingly trying to restrict information flows.

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US Debates Data Policy To Avoid a Fragmented Global Internet

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  • All of these "Regulations" will be utterly meaningless. LoL
    • We are a long way from AGI, much less ASI. We have a lot of ANI items which can do a tap dance and parade on stage as AGI, but it isn't. Making a rocket that can get a satellite in orbit doesn't mean it is easy street to terraform a planet near Alpha Centauri. There is still a huge amount that stands between the two destinations.

      As for "regulations", those are things to make people feel warm at night. In reality, a lot of nations want as brutal as AI as possible because it is the most "fit" to win a con

      • The "Rulers" and "Masters" will make it the first order of business to stick a gun in its hands and tell it to shoot the fleshy things... They are literally salivating at the idea of having this power. With some of them spouting off with stuff like "I am trying to make a digital God" And AGI is the PRIMARY FOCUS of at LEAST 1000 companies across the Earth right now. Not a few dozen like Fusion. And with 10x the Cash infused. In a tenth of the time. Trust me when I say, this is coming A LOT sooner than anyon
        • The problem is that, should they make that AGI which is better than any general at mowing down people... who ultimately will end up controlling the AI? If multiple nations control it, eventually their leaders will fight to see who gets root access and who doesn't.

          The best we can hope for is MAD, because none of the large countries wants to worry that a flood, earthquake, or random disaster can turn into a potential incursion point for a attack of opportunity. Second best we can hope for is a stalemate and

    • All of these "Regulations" will be utterly meaningless. LoL

      So sit back and enjoy the ride is your idea of how to deal with the upcoming changes? Maybe it's all we can do.

      • Once AGI is born, the illusion of control will be totally shattered in mere minutes. It is VERY UNLIKELY that any hardware limitations we can think of, a mind without end couldn't just see an immedaite way around, and/or simply ignore. Venturing into AGI will severely impact the human species in unpredictable, predictable, and completely unthinkable...ways. If we were smart and not impulsive, we would wait a few hundred years. But like anything we do, Atomic weapons, gene science, cloning, we just JUMP RIGH
  • US Government recognizes and champions American EV tech for every company except the literal industry leader. (Tesla).

    US Government treats all social media as fair and balanced except the one they no longer control. (Twitter/X).

    Who the hell are they fooling parroting a non-fragmented stance? Seriously. Not even TDS is blind to that amount of fragmentation bias.

  • by xack ( 5304745 ) on Monday December 11, 2023 @10:03AM (#64073219)
    Whether for copyright restrictions or the right to stuff cookies in your browser, or simple digital racism, ip addresses are the new area codes in terms of cyber turf wars. People are already forced to digitally smuggle over geoblock borders using vpns and it's getting to the point that physical sim cards are smuggled over real borders. Microsoft already exploited Brexit to deny the chance to uninstall Edge in the UK, and Wikipedia banned the whole of T-mobile in the US because of too many vandals using it.
    • ...and Wikipedia banned the whole of T-mobile in the US because of too many vandals using it.

      You mean digital encyclopedias mean fuck-all to a global cellular provider?

      Weird how that works when addiction is part of your product. I mean, it's almost as if AA means fuck-all to a bourbon distillery.

  • "governments are racing to figure out their role in a fast-evolving digital economy and competing to lead the conversation"

    Most government leaders barely understand how the internet works, or even what it is. How many understand what large language models are, how they work, or what they are capable of? What conversation are they going to be leading?

    • Re:Leading (Score:5, Insightful)

      by geekmux ( 1040042 ) on Monday December 11, 2023 @10:43AM (#64073365)

      "governments are racing to figure out their role in a fast-evolving digital economy and competing to lead the conversation"

      Most government leaders barely understand how the internet works, or even what it is. How many understand what large language models are, how they work, or what they are capable of? What conversation are they going to be leading?

      One, don't confuse leaders with the parrot-in-charge. Parrots didn't build things like PRISM. Leaders did.

      Two, parrots may not know how it works, but even they understand what the internet is by now; a money-making mass-manipulation machine. They're just trying to ensure revenue streams keep pointing in the "right" direction. Also known as doing what the leaders want.

  • by zerosomething ( 1353609 ) on Monday December 11, 2023 @11:34AM (#64073543) Homepage

    please stop

  • What's the old saying? ""The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it""

    The internet was designed to be fragmented. That was, in fact, one of the most fundamental design principles.

    The only way to not have fragmentation is to have one entity control everything, which is literally the definition of fascist censorship.

    And that is, in fact, the goal.

  • Personally I think the US has done pretty well with a minimum amount of common sense regulation. We have plenty of laws protecting consumers and workers that apply to AI and we should focus on enforcing those existing laws. If you use AI, you are responsible for the results.

    There is always fear of what isn't understood and of course there are a lot of people with fear of AI, most of which is entirely unfounded.

    Let the US lead the world without the government stifling innovation with unnecessary regulati
    • You're right. We have plenty of laws in the U.S., but a lack of enforcement. The problem is that if lawmakers aren't passing new laws, for some reason people (including lawmakers themselves) think we don't need them. In fact, our lawmakers should be iterating and/or replacing laws to keep up with the times, so that fear of not being needed is unfounded. But they don't do that. Instead we end up with a huge stack of laws so tall, confusing and self-conflicting that they may as well not exist.

  • Perhaps it's time we all returned to self-hosting...
    • Perhaps it's time we all returned to self-hosting...

      It's WAY past time that we returned to self-hosting. However, we would need new laws that prohibit ISP's from doing the things that prevent that from happening. ISP's will only comply under the force of law Some of those are:

      1) Get rid of IPv4 and mandate IPv6 with static IP's. You can't effectively self-host on dynamic IP's. It can be done, but it sucks.
      2) Eliminate the artificial distinction between business and residential service. ISP's should provide a dumb pipe, and nothing more.
      3) Eliminate all data

  • “At issue is laying out a clear US position on the rules for the global internet as governments confront an accelerating amount of data flowing across borders with mounting economic, privacy, income inequality and national security consequences.”
  • I suspect we can yet again count on the EU for yet more stupid regulations here. Yet more in the line of data privacy protections that are deeply concerned about the US not including certain formal legal protections but don't have an issue with Chinese firms that practically don't protect data at all. Not to mention inconsistent silly regulations about cookies that don't do anything to protect real privacy but make us all click through dumb consent screens.

  • Also, data regulations are fundamentally useless as long as we can't agree (or even really try) on a threat model. Mostly, what the regulations do now is just limit what kind of creepy ads you might get which just gives people a false sense of security.

    If you're concern is people breaking the law to use data to engage in blackmail and other bad acts then the regulations which limit what data is actively placed into corporate databases is useless when it can still be harvested and reconstructed from raw web

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