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The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

sanders.senate.gov

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Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#221

Post by pokstad »

LetsGetTechnicl wrote: post #159
pokstad wrote: post #149

If the public wants to own half of the AI company, then they should invest enough to buy half of it. Taking private property away without compensation is stealing. What the government did with Intel where they got 10% in stock was a bit better because Intel got money.

I mean gen AI is based on theft, I don't really see that as a deterrent. I don't want the companies to exist, and having government ownership sounds like a convenient way to get bailed out when the bubble pops

That only is true if you agree with IP laws. China doesn’t, and you won’t be able to take 50% of the Chinese AI companies. American AI companies won’t be able to compete against Chinese ones if we take that stance.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#222

Post by skeaker »

slackfan wrote: post #182
skeaker wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? He makes a compelling argument for his stance, and he is of course one man, not a business. If AI companies are going to have such a profound effect on the common man, including both you and me, then why shouldn't we have a say in how they operate? I can hardly say the same for Sanders' belongings.

He's a multimillionaire and I am not.

If your point is that you're trying to parrot Sanders' beliefs in a deliberately stupid way, it isn't working, because this isn't why he thinks the public should have a stake in how AI companies are being run. It's what you think he thinks after not having read the article.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#223

Post by scottyah »

jotux wrote: post #25
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #14

Bernie Sanders. I mean, he's not always wrong, but he's, um, kind of enthusiastic about just taking stuff from those who have it, considerably more than the current understanding of private property (or even taxation) considers acceptable.

>kind of enthusiastic about just taking stuff from those who have it, considerably more than the current understanding of private property (or even taxation) considers acceptable. Funny how you can use that description for how AI companies used everything for training data.

"You wouldn't download a blog post"?

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#224

Post by amanaplanacanal »

akramachamarei wrote: post #200
amanaplanacanal wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the flip side, without state protection, no man's life liberty or property would be safe either.

That's not quite true either. State protection is neither necessary nor sufficient to consistently ensure safety for any particular person or their property. Obviously, there's a sweet spot.

Hmmm. Are there stateless areas with consistent safety? Maybe I missed something.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#225

Post by nailer »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #132
nailer wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sovereign wealth fund? That seems like a great tool for a certain corrupt politician to use as a carrot to make CEO's bend to his/her whims. Taking ownership of these companies is a Bernie thing not a Trump thing, but a sovereign wealth fund is used to pay off national debt.

You can't "pay off debt" with a "wealth fund". You won't have any "wealth" if you use it. That's just taxing and spending...

Depends how much of the wealth you use but yes you're right - Norway and Singapore offset debt with the fund rather than pay it back.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#226

Post by akramachamarei »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #224
akramachamarei wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not quite true either. State protection is neither necessary nor sufficient to consistently ensure safety for any particular person or their property. Obviously, there's a sweet spot.

Hmmm. Are there stateless areas with consistent safety? Maybe I missed something.

Um, not that I know of. There probably are some, but very small. Depends on what you mean by area. When I spoke of "not necessary or sufficient", I thought I was careful to quantify that expression over individuals; sharing your original framing "no man's […]". Certainly some people may possess sufficient skill and will and influence and have few enough enemies to be safe for life without a state. And certainly some people possess such great weakness and incompetence and antipathy and have enough enemies that no state could protect them.

Maybe that's a nitpick on your phrasing but I am a licensed Picker of Nits (one who happens to be a minarchist, not an anarchist, for what it's worth.)

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#227

Post by dwaltrip »

akramachamarei wrote: post #210

Hackers should think of slavery reparations when they think of Sanders' proposal. Not as an equivalent, but as a more credible and similarly untenable idea. Sanders' being to take from those who produce to give to those who likely had almost no hand in the production, and with certainly no attempt to discern what contribution that may have been.

The Alaskan sovereign wealth fund is a much better metaphor.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#228

Post by tptacek »

jcranmer wrote: post #190
rayiner wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don’t have to be Jeff Bezos to believe you’re better off in the long run with strong property rights. To your example: I’ve got 10 gig fiber from a private company. My alternatives are 2 gig fiber from a private company, or 2 gig cable from a private company. I don’t have to be Jeff Bezos to wager that, if the people who ran Baltimore City Public Schools ran my broadband service, I wouldn’t have even 1 gig servic…

I live in a town with municipal power, and the general consensus in the area is that the towns with municipal power are loads better at it than the main private utilities in the area. There's no intrinsic reason why a publicly-owned utility should be better or worse at its job than privately-owned utility. But to talk about broadband more specifically, one of the main reasons why municipal broadband started becoming…

We flirt with the idea of municipal broadband every couple of years (we built dense fiber connectivity throughout the village a decade or so ago for other reasons). But the economics are brutal; to pencil, you need significant uptake, and you're competing with AT&T and Xfinity, both of which (if you're clear-eyed) are better offerings than the muni can compete with, so you're not going to get that uptake.

The buildout issue is real, and is a reason to explore public-owned broadband in underinvested areas. But even if we had only AT&T here, none of the arguments really work. Even the monopolism concern isn't operative (AT&T and Xfinity don't jack their rates up in places they happen to be the monopoly supplier --- they quote nationally visible rates).

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#229

Post by chasd00 »

vrganj wrote: post #196
jcranmer wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the case of Alaska, the oil is literally on land owned by the State of Alaska (as in, the titleholder of the land is the state itself), and the rights to oil extraction is leased by the state to oil companies. By contrast, data centers are generally going to be on land owned by the operator, and corporate offices are either owned by the company or leased to the company by some commercial real estate operator you'v…

The sovereign entity granting said private ownership is the state. It is privately owned only insofar as the state wills it.

> It is privately owned only insofar as the state wills it.

you mean as the people/voters wills it. Private ownership of land is pretty sacred law in the US, I don't see those laws being changed any time soon. Even logical things like the concept of eminent domain is very controversial.

Re: The Public Should Own Half of the Big A.I. Companies

#230

Post by tracker1 »

The fact that AI is largely trained on unlicensed IP from the people is probably the single most coherent argument in favor of govt forced socialism on private entities I've probably ever considered. Not that I agree with all of the statements, assertions or point in TFA.

I say this as a conservative leaning libertarian even.

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