Generative AI will die at the hands of regulators, says law professor

Santa Clara University law professor Eric Goldman predicts that generative artificial intelligence will be drowned in a "tsunami of regulation" by authorities. This gloomy forecast jeopardises the ambitions of tech giants like Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft, which are actively investing in machine-generated content creation.

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According to Goldman, the influx of regulations and bureaucracy threatening the generative AI industry is driven by several factors, including fears of copyright infringement and hostility to big tech.

Companies are trying to mitigate regulatory pressure through initiatives like the industry's AI Safety Consortium, aimed at preventing models from creating images of child sexual exploitation. However, Goldman believes these efforts are insufficient.

He points to the plethora of copyright lawsuits threatening generative AI, as well as growing polarisation in society and increasing scepticism about the technology.

According to Goldman, today's regulators are a far cry from the 1990s' favourability towards the internet. Instead of creating a flexible and balanced rule structure, they are declaring a "regulatory frenzy" almost unconstrained by existing laws.

The professor predicts that because of the "tsunami of regulation," the generative AI industry in its current form may not survive. Large companies are likely to try to impose licence fees to mitigate legal risks, but this will drive up costs and limit competition.

Source: The Register