Colin McCune, Head of Government Affairs at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), explains the policy gap that led to creating the firm's Little Tech Agenda.
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McCune: Effective Altruists spent a decade funding think tanks to steer AI
“You know, from my point of view and look, you know, they deserve a lot of credit. I think the effect of altruist community for 10 years backed by large sums of money were very, very effective at influencing think tanks and nonprofit organizations in D.C. And t…”
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McCune: Current AI tech lobbying is dwarfed by decade of safety spending
“But I mean, when people are writing these articles about the fact that the AI industry is, you know, pumping all this money into the system, Certainly, like, I'm not suggesting that there's not money in the system. We're obviously active on the political and p…”
What-if
McCune: Regulating AI like nuclear power would cause U.S. to lose to China
“Had we done the same thing in AI in that period of time, then you don't have the medical advancements. You don't have the breakthroughs. You don't have all of the things that come from this that are incredible. But beyond that, we lose to China. Full stop.”
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McCune: Restricting U.S. AI exports will allow China to capture global markets
“The more that we lock down obviously American products, the more Chinese, the Chinese will enter those markets and sort of take a land grab in that space.”
Disclosure
McCune: a16z donated to Leading the Future PAC for AI political advocacy
“And that's, you know, part of the reason that we have recently announced our donation to leading the future pack, which will have, you know, several different entities underneath it, which I think is, Is designed to sort of be that political center of gravity …”
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McCune: Lawmakers are using AI policy to fix the 1996 Telecom Act
“There are a number of members of Congress that feel like, well, we missed it on the 96 telecom act. Like that wasn't, we didn't do good enough around then. So we need to rewrite the wrongs through the venue of an AI policy conversation”