The article only lists US labs, I wonder if that was an oversight. Chinese models are also available to Europeans through API providers. Surely they risk fines too.. right?
Even Brussels knows that would be futile
The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
31–40 of 109 posts
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#32Claude slop article aside, this act is one reason why some people say Europe is an open air museum, as it'd rather regulate itself to obscurity while its great works are behind it. Where is Mistral, Le Chaton Fat? They're not competitive anymore. Meanwhile China reaches ever forward because they know that speed and endurance is everything in a race, not shooting oneself in the foot.
You’ll get downvoted to oblivion but it’s true in endless ways even before AI. The EUs obsession with green energy and destroying nuclear in Germany, the wealth taxes, the bureaucracy, how it’s 10x easier to get disability than it is to start a corporation. Death by a thousand cuts. I don’t see this improving until real, visible pain is felt. They are so poor economically but the consequences are not being felt yet
The anti-EU comments are always the same shape, unable to separate the EU from individual countries and misattributing country specific policies to the entire EU. Only a few countries in the EU have wealth taxes, and it's not the EU who imposed them. Disability pensions are not easy to get and require a lot of medical paperwork and approvals in most EU countries. And what does "so poor economically" even mean?
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
I really oppose the notion that “European legislation … disproportionately impacts American tech companies”. US tech has a profound impact on the lives of everyday Europeans while the US has almost no checks and balances in place for the tech industry. Europeans are ought to be able decide how they want to live their lives and build a society. This must include deciding how much influence American tech companies shal…
Also, most US citizens want the same regulations as EU citizens, but only one of them have a functioning government.
No they don't.
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#34The article only lists US labs, I wonder if that was an oversight. Chinese models are also available to Europeans through API providers. Surely they risk fines too.. right?
It doesn't say meta or thinking machines were asked. Does that mean asking them is futile, even though they are American labs?
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#35Claude slop article aside, this act is one reason why some people say Europe is an open air museum, as it'd rather regulate itself to obscurity while its great works are behind it. Where is Mistral, Le Chaton Fat? They're not competitive anymore. Meanwhile China reaches ever forward because they know that speed and endurance is everything in a race, not shooting oneself in the foot.
The key problem for Europe is that they don't want to take strong enough actions against US tech to let their own actors develop. Which is how China has reached tech dominance, and how even a shithole country like Russia can have their own “tech” industry.
Even in a hypothetical world where they somehow killed off US tech completely, they still wouldn't have their own actors develop. There is no collective will, no risk taking mindset. The VCs are cowardly with capital, and people don't follow through on bright ideas. Taxes and regulations suffocate any progress and no one wants to do anything about it.
The EU would rather cruise off into perceived comfort and safety rather than attempt to stay relevant economically and on the world stage. Only when the region is unable to afford its own welfare will it start wondering where things went wrong.
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why would they, both the EU and Mistral specifically, want Chinese models? Isn't the (de facto, underlying) point of the act to raise up homegrown companies like Mistral?
The Chinese models are open weights, so they can host & finetune them in the EU. Mistral is calling them "European Compute Units". Mistral has pivoted to become a hosting provider of open weight LLMs. "Mistral’s platform will support third-party open models, starting with Z.ai’s GLM-5.2. This and future open models will run on the same infrastructure, regional controls, and service commitments as Mistral models, so c…
Giving open weight models more leeway “feels” right, but it’s a massive self-pwn based on the mother of all back doors.
It’s a little bit like saying “sysadmins need work visas and vetting, but this guy works for free, so just give him root and don’t think too hard about it”.
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#37I doubt it’s the end of AI access in Europe. Even if they do fine them 3% of global turnover, that’s probably a small enough fraction of their European revenue that it’s worth the risk. After all if they drop European traffic it’s not like it’ll change their fixed costs, and the marginal cost to serve Europe is probably relatively small compared to their fixed costs. I do think it’s most likely that they will end up…
I really oppose the notion that “European legislation … disproportionately impacts American tech companies”. US tech has a profound impact on the lives of everyday Europeans while the US has almost no checks and balances in place for the tech industry. Europeans are ought to be able decide how they want to live their lives and build a society. This must include deciding how much influence American tech companies shal…
Isn't part of " Europeans are ought to be able to decide how they want to live their lives" that they have the choice of using products of US tech companies?
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
You’ll get downvoted to oblivion but it’s true in endless ways even before AI. The EUs obsession with green energy and destroying nuclear in Germany, the wealth taxes, the bureaucracy, how it’s 10x easier to get disability than it is to start a corporation. Death by a thousand cuts. I don’t see this improving until real, visible pain is felt. They are so poor economically but the consequences are not being felt yet
The anti-EU comments are always the same shape, unable to separate the EU from individual countries and misattributing country specific policies to the entire EU. Only a few countries in the EU have wealth taxes, and it's not the EU who imposed them. Disability pensions are not easy to get and require a lot of medical paperwork and approvals in most EU countries. And what does "so poor economically" even mean?
It’s the mentality of the electorate. Without serious, horrible pain, which I truly believe will be felt over the coming 25 years, politicians won’t be elected who really embrace it. The welfare state can’t continue its current form without new innovative companies operating at a global scale. You can point to a few successes but without a grand, EU-wide mentality-shift I will continue to visit Europe exactly as I see it: a sclerotic, decaying old-world system that’s best use is a museum for my tourist dollars
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
Then they'll just pull out eventually and save everyone the trouble.
Like how Apple famously pulled out of the EU?
They did with some services. Not sure if there is a list. For one I am missing phone mirroring to my mac which they disabled because they do not want to give api access.
Re: The EU has begun enforcing the AI Act: first RFIs to model providers
#40Claude slop article aside, this act is one reason why some people say Europe is an open air museum, as it'd rather regulate itself to obscurity while its great works are behind it. Where is Mistral, Le Chaton Fat? They're not competitive anymore. Meanwhile China reaches ever forward because they know that speed and endurance is everything in a race, not shooting oneself in the foot.
The idea was that technology is now powerful enough, everything need not be just competition any more. The world could also work to let every human have a good life. Neither China nor America truly seem to have that goal, despite it being both possible and ethical. Europe at least did, based on our experiences of the horrors of the early/mid C20.
It's true that in the last 10 years that vision feels like it has crumbled. And the inevitableness of competition is coming back. International law and human rights are dissolving - rule based on power. This works well for anyone while it works for them - except for our souls, and longer term... It's hubristic and eventually empires fall. Europe has already experienced this, and remembers it.
Whether these empires will fall to global economic collapse from lack of co-operation, or environmental destruction from lack of charging for externalities, or from global war, or simply from out of control AI, remains to be seen.
But never question, it is possible to avoid all those. But we have to try to, not just cheaply go "competition good", because of the short term thrill of the win. Competition is good, and so is cooperation.