rapture but for tech people

Not really. The problem is that the trust is violated here. What people fear is that government and large companies are going to use AI against them, and make the reverse impossible. Sadly, this is exactly what is happening.

And that's exactly what EU's AI regulation does. Of course, AI is being blamed for this happening, despite that last time I checked every EU parlementarian, every EU commission member is flesh and blood, the fact that it is 100% intentional government policy, humans, that are doing this to you using very un-AI methods.

You see, in this regulation, governments are allowed to use AI, and to approve uses of AI. So there is absolutely nothing in EU's AI directive at all that prevents government and large companies, with approval, from answering the phone, and all "support requests" with AI, and not with people. Also "if you agree" (just like you've agreed to selling your location data in your cell contract)

The watermarking algorithm itself has a VERY specific property that should have set off everyone's alarm bells: it is NOT the case that you can "check text for AI watermark". What it technically mandates is that if you provide access to a model, those people should be able to check if text is generated by that model. Not by any other model. It is NOT a general "is this AI?" check. So let's analyze how this works in 2 specific cases:

You get a mail from the government about taxes. You want to check if that text is generated by an AI and whether you even should ask to talk to a human. So you've got a piece of text, or an audio recording. Can you check if it's AI or not? NO YOU CAN'T. SynthID requires access to the model keys, and the legislation only mandates checks if you've got access to the model.

The government or some large company, however, puts in it's regulations that you're not allowed to use AI to communicate with them (we all know this is coming), and they get a piece of ChatGPT text (or from any public model) from you. They would like to enforce that they won't talk to AI can they do this? YES, since they have access to the model too, SynthID allows for this usecase AND the AI regulation makes this mandatory.

Is this in any way a problem with AI? No. Can anything be done about this by "fighting AI"? Well let's see ... will government institutions be forced to stop worsening services further if ChatGPT etc become inaccessible or obviously excluded by government and large company services? No.

What is being outlawed in the EU, in other words, is exactly ONE thing: that you use AI to help you in your dealings with governments and large companies. To assert your rights, to resolve issues faster, to make them wait rather than you, to ... THAT is being outlawed, nothing else. Only that YOU get help from AI.

This legislation will make it a big advantage to have access to "your own" model, because you'll have the SynthID keys, and the law behind you if you do that. And I don't mean local model, I mean your own model with your own SynthID keys, ie. not Google, not ChatGPT, not Claude, not Grok, and if the EU can make it happen, not Chinese models either. Finetuned models, however, will not have SynthID and so you'll never be able to prove text generated by them is AI, and you will not effectively have the power to refuse contracts or laws that specify they can use AI anyway.

It's the EU government making it clear they are using AI to avoid even having to talk to you at all while disallowing the use of AI by mere citizens to assert their rights, against them, or anything they have interests in, like phone or electricity companies.

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RandomLensman 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

>The watermarking algorithm itself has a VERY specific property that should have set off everyone's alarm bells: it is NOT the case that you can "check text for AI watermark". What it technically mandates is that if you provide access to a model, those people should be able to check if text is generated by that model. Not by any other model. It is NOT a general "is this AI?"

Where do I find that in the Act (or code of practice etc.)? IANAL, but Article 50 reads different to me but if there is a comment or guide how to read it - also fair enough.

	▲	rvba an hour ago \| parent [-]
		It sounds like anti EU propaganda.

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trentor 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The only factual point you made is solved on February second. All Model providers have to provide offline tooling to check for invisible watermarking.

	▲	disgruntledphd2 2 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Yeah, it's particularly common when the EU does stuff.
	▲	spwa4 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		There is nothing in the AI act that requires offline tooling, nor is there anything about requiring the passwords and/or API to work for every model, only for the people you are providing the model to. “The detection solution may be made available in the Union as one or more of the following: (i) a public, ideally standardised, specification allowing any third party to implement a detection mechanism; (ii) a piece of software (e.g., a standalone executable or library); (iii) a cloud-based service accessible to users in the Union through an API.” Option 3: "a cloud-based service". And accessible "to users". NOT to the public. Note: this is not the actual law, it is the code of practice, ie. guidance for model providers. The start of that document clearly states that you can comply with the law in other ways if you want, you'll just have to justify yourself. So you have a choice to not even do this. The actual law is here: https://ai-act-service-desk.ec.europa.eu/en/ai-act/article-5... As to who decides the law clearly states who decides if someone is legal, like in most EU legislation. It's not the courts, it's "National market surveillance authorities designated by each EU Member State", and there is an EU office as well (and it is explicitly stated that they are not allowed to override each other). So every EU country has the right to provide exceptions to the law, just like they do for the GPDR. You do not have any rights under this legislation as an individual. Only these "National market surveillance authorities" get rights under this legislation. Secondary: article 7 additionally gives the EU commission the power to declare any code of conduct they want that declares what compliance with the AI act actually means. (and, of course, this is yet another attempt at declaring math illegal. The only way to actually enforce this legislation is for all models to comply with this, all over the internet. Obviously the EU does not remotely have the power to make that happen)

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pjc50 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

While there is a large element of paranoia here, we're already seeing serious problems in e.g. planning consultations that people can just spam them with AI. AI makes a lot of traditional social processes stop working properly.

> puts in it's regulations that you're not allowed to use AI to communicate with them (we all know this is coming),

.. do we?

> You get a mail from the government about taxes. You want to check if that text is generated by an AI

No, actually, I want to know whether it's correct and whether it's legally binding. Using AI makes it less likely to be correct, sure, but ultimately whether it's human, spreadsheet, or AI the important thing is the legal right to correct process.

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cucumber3732842 42 minutes ago | parent [-]

>AI makes a lot of traditional social processes stop working properly.

Which is mostly a good thing because most of those processes were cooked up to be exclusionary but with plausible deniability

God forbid some upstart get a big contract they "shouldn't" have gotten because AI lets them create a submission that's on par with a big guys.

God forbid Joe Schmo be able to prepare the paperwork and dot his I's and cross his T's and be able to take advantage of some stupid zoning exemption that you spec'd out to essentially be only available to big moneyed interests.

The ability to suffer one's way through beurocratic process without having to suffer through paying the lawyers and accountants and engineers and whatnot to get you through that process is a huge part of the value proposition of AI. But people don't frame it like for obvious reasons.

	▲	cindyllm 11 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		[dead]

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watwut an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

I trust EU massively more then I trust to Amodei.