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AI.gov

ai.gov

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Re: AI.gov

#41

Post by oshout »

zzzzzzzza wrote: post #17
cedws wrote: post #4

Our governments care dearly about "AI safety" (nobody actually knows what that means or is qualified to define it yet) but not a right to privacy.

"Protecting Americans’ Privacy" is the second top level bullet point out of 8 top level bullet points

I realize you're making a direct reference but scare-quotes seem more applicable.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Eyes "documents of the FVEY have shown that they are intentionally spying on one another's citizens and sharing the collected information with each other"

Re: AI.gov

#42

Post by jerry1979 »

aduffy wrote: post #25
empath-nirvana wrote: post #9

The US government can't legally pay the salaries required to find AI experts right now (just look at the salaries on the open positions). So all this work will end up being done by contractors who _can_ pay those salaries while the contractors skim off the top. The US really needs a special schedule for software developers if they want technical expertise in house (and they really should have technical expertise in h…

Recoding America[1] is an excellent book about this problem, but it extends a lot further than just contractors charging inflated rates. The government itself has a culture that is so averse to trying new things and compliance with existing policy that it's actually dangerous to the careers of civil servants to do anything innovative, because that is one of the only things they can actually be fired for. The solution…

> she proposes effectively would be an expansion of the US Digital Service (which the author spearheaded) into something that approximates the British civil service

This sounds like a very brave proposal.

Re: AI.gov

#43

Post by enumjorge »

godelski wrote: post #24
empath-nirvana wrote: post #9

The US government can't legally pay the salaries required to find AI experts right now (just look at the salaries on the open positions). So all this work will end up being done by contractors who _can_ pay those salaries while the contractors skim off the top. The US really needs a special schedule for software developers if they want technical expertise in house (and they really should have technical expertise in h…

Some of the jobs go up to $180k/yr. That's not too bad considering it doesn't look like it requires DC location. But others like the grad assistant for $22/hr is laughable. Still, I agree there's a problem with salaries not being competitive. I've interned at DOE labs before and lots of people don't stay for long.

"Up to" $180k for expertise in a field that is as technical and in as much demand as AI is low. For experts in AI, I wouldn't be surprised if their total comp in larger tech companies is around $500k-$1M.

You can expect to find some experts with a stronger sense of civic duty willing to take a pay cut to work for the government, but when you're talking about multiple multiples of your salary, you're going to be left with people who are not top talent or those who are already so wealthy from other jobs that they're willing to work for much less.

Re: AI.gov

#44

Post by dylan604 »

mattnewton wrote: post #12
Beta-7 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nobody actually knows what that means I sure hope it doesn't mean the government will shape the future of AI development how they see fit.

No that seems to be exactly the plan. Or rather, how some lobbyists they are talking to see fit. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/10/30/biden-a...

this is the real thing. this looks like it's gov't legislation, but we all know that it is corporate lobbyists that actually provide that legislation.

Re: AI.gov

#45

Post by tbrownaw »

ak_111 wrote: post #36

Off topic, my initial reaction was it would have been more of a flex if they managed to get the domain gov.ai, since US gov already owns the .gov TLD, but it turns out that this domain is already used by government of Anguilla which already owns the ai TLD. Looking into this further, I also learnt that in fact selling ai TLD has become a non-trivial part of Anguilla's GDP since chatgpt was released.

Even if it wasn't already used, putting putting official government stuff somewhere that's under the control of a different government is maybe not the best of plans.

I'm even mildly annoyed that the website for the city I live in is under .org rather than under .${STATE_CODE}.us where it should be.

Re: AI.gov

#46

Post by ethbr1 »

ak_111 wrote: post #36

Off topic, my initial reaction was it would have been more of a flex if they managed to get the domain gov.ai, since US gov already owns the .gov TLD, but it turns out that this domain is already used by government of Anguilla which already owns the ai TLD. Looking into this further, I also learnt that in fact selling ai TLD has become a non-trivial part of Anguilla's GDP since chatgpt was released.

Oh, look at the tortured path that .io dollars take, since it's technically a TLD for an occupied country, being operated by someone (Ethos Capital) with no connection to or permission from the original or current inhabitants.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/.io#History

Re: AI.gov

#47

Post by Spoom »

godzillabrennus wrote: post #40
jmac01 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what you're saying is, government is too..... Conservative? :p Maybe we are just feeling the effects that the modern American "left" is basically just the American right of the 60s lol We need some actual liberals who aren't just socially liberal but also willing to spend money on new ideas.

We spend plenty of money on ideas. We need to pay for results. We should stop pretending government is ever going to be good at buying/building tech and change procurement to pay for innovative results. How many $50 or $100M government tech projects have to fail before we let them post an RFP that basically says do this thing in this amount of time for this amount of money with payment after we get the “thing” in tim…

Going through the procurement process itself results in massive delays (have you tried bidding on a federal government contract?), a race to the bottom (since the government more or less has to accept the lowest bid), and massive overspecification by policy writers (mostly to try to salvage some quality from these RFPs).

Echoing that Recoding America is a great book to read even if you have nothing to do with the federal government. You might see some similarities in how large companies operate.

Re: AI.gov

#48

Post by 72mena »

tsunamifury wrote: post #31

So far the support of Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Cisco/Akami have given the US government a business, intelligence, and social engineering platform the likes the world has never seen before, and still people today wildly undervalue its power in the world today. They have effectively deplatformed Europe, South America, the Middle East and Asia, put anyone but China within second reach from a mass data coll…

> "America's global brain drain might have been the single most effective strategy"

The website has a section titled "Bring your AI Skills to the U.S.", and then a button with this label "Learn about pathways to work in the U.S.".

This is very encouraging. And it reminded me of Eric Schmidt's recommendation on this topic [1], which was published on the final report of the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence:

Chapter 10. Page 178:

"Nations that can successfully attract and retain highly skilled individuals gain strategic and economic advantages over competitors." [...] "Unfortunately, international students in the United States are increasingly choosing to study in other countries or return home. One reason is the growing backlog of green card petitions. Indian immigrants face a particularly long wait. Many will spend decades on constrictive work visas waiting to receive their green cards, hindering both the technology sector’s ability to recruit talent and Indian immigrants’ quality of life."

The report recommends to focus on building better Immigration Policies. Maybe this .gov initiative listened to the advice from the report.

[1]: https://www.nscai.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Full-Report...

Re: AI.gov

#49

Post by fkyoureadthedoc »

j45 wrote: post #26
aduffy wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Recoding America[1] is an excellent book about this problem, but it extends a lot further than just contractors charging inflated rates. The government itself has a culture that is so averse to trying new things and compliance with existing policy that it's actually dangerous to the careers of civil servants to do anything innovative, because that is one of the only things they can actually be fired for. The solution…

Bureaucrats are so risk averse to such an extent that the culture can have an allergy to trying to do things different or better too quickly (including innovation).

Did you just strip the context and rephrase exactly what the parent comment says?

Re: AI.gov

#50

Post by JustifyContent »

BHSPitMonkey wrote: post #23
Racing0461 wrote: post #21

[flagged]

Resist what? What exactly is unusual about this?

Likely a right-winger who thinks immigration - even immigration of people who are talented in developing the most important technology of our time - is really bad. So they "couldn't resist" offering more immigration opportunities to people.
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