Keep your AI claims in check • Hacker News Board

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#271

Post by Avalaxy » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 9:13 AM UTC

lukeramsden wrote: post #266

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like you may have missed the stampede of “AI” companies coming out of the woodwork the last few months. For every legitimate AI project, there have been a thousand “entrepreneurs” who spend 4 hours putting a webflow site on top of GPT APIs and claim they’ve built an “AI product”. There’s no limit on the amount of BS benefits they claim. They seem like the same people who just finished running the crypto sca…

> spend 4 hours putting a webflow site on top of GPT APIs GPT _is_ AI though, no? I would think that this would count. Might violate "a re you exaggerating what your AI product can do" or "are you aware of the risks" instead though.

> GPT _is_ AI though

Well, it does not at all have the "intelligence" part of "artificial intelligence", so not really.

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#272

Post by 10000truths » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 9:38 AM UTC

klyrs wrote: post #190

mathgenius wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Deterministic if/then statements This was the pinnacle of AI in the 80's. They called them "expert systems".

Principle problem being that expert systems required meticulous inputs from domain experts, codified by skilled engineers. People don't have time or startup capital for actual expertise...

And AI requires the same thing, we just call them data scientists and ML engineers. Using linear-ish algebra instead of decision trees doesn't change the the fact that you need time and capital to hire experts.

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#273

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 9:51 AM UTC

genocidicbunny wrote: post #144

dcow wrote: post #129

I mean cool. But honestly what is this "fairness and equity" bullshit? Trying to nip false advertising in the bud is one thing and I believe something the FTC has authority over. But who in the world granted the FTC the authority to pursue the fairness and equity of any product, let alone an AI product? I mean I'm not anti-fairness but I'm also astonished to see the FTC trying to regulate it. Thou shalt not sell a pr…

If you actually go read the linked article, it's pretty clearly spelled out: The FTC has decades of experience enforcing three laws important to developers and users of AI: Section 5 of the FTC Act. The FTC Act prohibits unfair or deceptive practices. That would include the sale or use of – for example – racially biased algorithms. Fair Credit Reporting Act. The FCRA comes into play in certain circumstances where an…

[deleted]

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#274

Post by wiz21c » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 9:51 AM UTC

FTC's language may be a bit rough on the edges, but marketeers' language is quite often deceptive (like when one says: "probably the best in the world": factually correct but very misleading).

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#275

Post by roenxi » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 9:54 AM UTC

flatline wrote: post #36

“It’s an ambiguous term with many possible definitions.” “Does the product actually use AI at all? If you think you can get away with baseless claims…” Last I checked basic optimization techniques like simulated annealing and gradient descent - as well as a host of basic statistical tools - are standard parts of an introductory AI textbook. I’ve been on the receiving end of government agency enforcement (SEC) and it…

There is also the high level question of why exactly the government needs to police this. If it turns out that some Stable Diffusion frontend was actually sending the prompts to a team of Indians who happen to draw really quickly; that is no reason to get the enforcers involved.

If examined closely, the finger wagging in this post is remarkably petty. This guy was likely part of the angry crowd who didn't like Steve Jobs describing the iPhone as "magical". The standard should be "a lie that causes measurable, material harm", not some company exaggerated in their advertising. Advertisers exaggerate, that is just something people have to live with.

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#276

Post by amelius » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 10:16 AM UTC

roenxi wrote: post #275

flatline wrote: post #36

“It’s an ambiguous term with many possible definitions.” “Does the product actually use AI at all? If you think you can get away with baseless claims…” Last I checked basic optimization techniques like simulated annealing and gradient descent - as well as a host of basic statistical tools - are standard parts of an introductory AI textbook. I’ve been on the receiving end of government agency enforcement (SEC) and it…

There is also the high level question of why exactly the government needs to police this. If it turns out that some Stable Diffusion frontend was actually sending the prompts to a team of Indians who happen to draw really quickly; that is no reason to get the enforcers involved. If examined closely, the finger wagging in this post is remarkably petty. This guy was likely part of the angry crowd who didn't like Steve…

The problem is that this ends with everybody calling their product magic and the word losing its original meaning; soon after it will have a meaning closer to "disappointing" or "lame".

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#277

Post by saycleearly » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 10:38 AM UTC

I find fascinating the final remark: You don’t need a machine to predict what the FTC might do when those claims are unsupported.

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#278

Post by londons_explore » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 10:44 AM UTC

This is an interesting writing style for a .gov webpage...

It gives me hope that someone in the government actually cares about doing their job for the benefit of the public.

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#279

Post by bryanrasmussen » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 10:46 AM UTC

roenxi wrote: post #275

flatline wrote: post #36

“It’s an ambiguous term with many possible definitions.” “Does the product actually use AI at all? If you think you can get away with baseless claims…” Last I checked basic optimization techniques like simulated annealing and gradient descent - as well as a host of basic statistical tools - are standard parts of an introductory AI textbook. I’ve been on the receiving end of government agency enforcement (SEC) and it…

There is also the high level question of why exactly the government needs to police this. If it turns out that some Stable Diffusion frontend was actually sending the prompts to a team of Indians who happen to draw really quickly; that is no reason to get the enforcers involved. If examined closely, the finger wagging in this post is remarkably petty. This guy was likely part of the angry crowd who didn't like Steve…

>If it turns out that some Stable Diffusion frontend was actually sending the prompts to a team of Indians who happen to draw really quickly; that is no reason to get the enforcers involved.

Well, if the enforcement agency is the SEC I would think that it made a good deal of difference to the actual value of your company?

Re: Keep your AI claims in check

#280

Post by bryanrasmussen » Tue, Feb 28, 2023, 10:47 AM UTC

duskwuff wrote: post #182

SoftAnnaLee wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I don't disagree with the basic premise ("AI" as a specific falsifiable term is hard to pin down due to the ubiquity associated with the term); I do think there are specific cut-and-dry circumstances where the FTC could falsifiably prove your product does not include AI. For example, using an alternative of Amazon's Mechanical Turk to process data is clearly a case where your product does not use AI. Which I be…

On the other end of the spectrum, calling a feature of a product "AI" seems to imply some minimal level of complexity. If, for example, a company marketed a toaster that "uses AI to toast your bread perfectly", I would expect that language to indicate something more sophisticated than an ordinary mechanical thermostat.

I would expect it to never burn that toast.