In 1865, Britain passed its infamous “Red Flag” Act — copied in many other places — to regulate for self-propelled vehicles. It required a crew of three for each vehicle, one member of which was to walk 60 yards ahead with a red flag to warn horses and riders of the vehicle’s approach. It also imposed a four-mile-per-hour speed limit, or two miles per hour in populated areas.
Why is this relevant now? Because attempts some 158 years later to regulate cryptocurrencies and artificial intelligence will seem equally silly to future generations. Technology transforms society according to its functionality and what people want to do with it, not conservative regulations passed by clueless officials.
The collapse of crypto exchange FTX in November 2022, capping a “horribilis annus” for big-name, regulated digital currencies, combined with the demo release of ChatGPT the same month, sent venture capital money fleeing from crypto and into AI. A harder-to-measure, longer-term trend among academics and top developers seems to be favouring the steady, quiet progress of working in AI over the scandal-ridden, boom-and-bust of crypto. These trends are more consequential for the future than anything done in Washington, the ups and downs of Bitcoin, or how non-venture capital is allocated. The automobile — and radio and the Internet and genetic engineering — transformed society in fundamental ways, unrelated to regulators’ wishes or stock prices or anything the media was covering at the time.
US Needs ‘Comprehensive Legislation’ for AI, Says Senate Majority Schumer
