Nathaniel Whittemore

I don't think it's an unreasonable interpretation to see this as the administration treating this sort of AI safety regulation as some version of eating its vegetables, rather than the Big Mac or the well-done steak that it would prefer.

The order does contain some language reaffirming the administration's commitment to AI acceleration, talking about a commitment to the United States' AI global dominance, but ultimately this was the sort of Rorschach test policy that gives everyone something to comment on, everyone something to claim victory around, while ultimately doing very little.

The New York Times reported the order as, in their words, signaling a shift from the hands-off approach the White House had previously taken toward AI.

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, however, called this lazy and inaccurate reporting from the New York Times, trying to draw a line in the sand around the difference between oversight and voluntary sharing.

The EO, they wrote, creates a process for frontier labs to voluntarily share cutting-edge cyber models in order to secure critical infrastructure and strengthen the government's own cyber defenses.

We are not conducting oversight of all new models, as that level of government overreach would have chilling effects on free speech and innovation.

David Sachs himself chimed in to explain that the policy is intended to only cover models that, in his words, represent, quote, meaningful step change in cyber capabilities, i.e.

mythos, not incremental changes to existing models like Opus 4.8.

He also took the chance to comment on the slippery slope argument, writing, I understand the concerns of many that this could morph into an FDA for AI.

Of course, bureaucratic mission creep is always a danger and this should be closely monitored, but the EO expressly forbids the creation of a new licensing, preclearance, or permitting regime.

From the labs, all of the commentary was pretty similar.

Clearly, talking points were circulated, suggesting they all used the language of this being a, quote, important step.

Former White House advisor Dean Ball was concerned about the implications of this first step, calling it a, quote, fairly major win for the safety contingent within the administration and a significant loss for the SAC's accelerationist wing.

Now, Dean, despite SAC's assurances to the contrary, thinks this heads in exactly one way.

He writes...

This is clearly teeing up the infrastructure for a model licensing regime, and the fact that the administration is classifying the details of how this voluntary system will work is egregious.

The public and the employees of the labs have a right to know how this works.

Most lab staff don't have clearances, but if the literal regulatory thresholds that trigger pre-deployment review are classified, researchers themselves won't know whether what they are training is regulated by this EO.

All for a benefit that is barely articulable?

What exactly is the intelligence community going to do in 30 days to make the model safer?