U.S. lawmakers seem ready to hold A.I. developers accountable: ‘We are not going to repeat the mistake of Section 230’

On A.I., efforts are underway on Capitol Hill to come up with a regulatory framework that may not be as prescriptive as the one taking shape in Brussels, but still will lay down ground rules. “We are not going to repeat the mistake of Section 230,” said one senator, referencing the 1996 law that provided immunity to online platforms for the content generated by their users.

And on China, despite the administration’s efforts to increase engagement, the political parties are competing on who will be toughest. Even members of the business community—which normally favors engagement—reported efforts to reduce their exposure to China out of fear both of what a protectionist U.S. government may do and what an increasingly authoritarian and militaristic Chinese government may do.

Since it is Friday, some feedback. E.G. pushes back against the hype over ChatGPT, and says:

“A.I. should not be telescoped into GPT. Predictive A.I. may be a better tool, as it is more based in objectivity. GPT is more subjective.”

“Subjective,” of course, is putting it nicely. Chat GPT makes things up. This now-famous New York Times story about a lawyer’s brief that included made-up case citations illustrates the issue. Young legal associates may make mistakes, but if they fabricate court decisions, I assume they are instantly fired. The same for journalists who concoct facts. Which led R.D. to write:

“A challenge for sure, which is a big reason we need journalists of impeccable reputation. Where is Walter Cronkite, Scotty Reston, Paul Steiger…?”

Following Peter’s and my posts on ESG–which clearly is not a source of bipartisan agreement—S.K. offered the following:

“If ESG wants to navigate the ever-meandering political shoals I suggest they list the top 20 objectives and then score them with a Consensus Matrix. The 10 initiatives with the most total monthly media mentions (total by sources from either side) should lose budget while the 10 least mentioned/least controversial initiatives should correspondingly gain budget. This sort of noise-averse rebalancing can move people with fiduciary responsibilities toward less noisy work—doing good while gently stepping away from controversy.”

My guess is that, for better or worse, something like that rebalancing is already quietly happening.

CEO Daily is off on Monday for Juneteenth. We’ll see you back here Tuesday. More news below.

Alan Murray
@alansmurray
alan.murray@fortune.com

TOP NEWS

Cava debut

Fast casual chain Cava surged on its first day trading on the New York Stock Exchange Thursday. Shares closed at $43.78, almost double the IPO price. The company's strong debut is a windfall for its shareholders, including former Panera CEO Ron Shaich, whose 11% stake in the company is now worth over $530 million. Fortune

Reddit CEO

The CEO of social media site Reddit is not backing down from a controversial demand that third parties pay for access to the company’s data and content. The website’s communities are protesting the change by hiding their content, yet CEO Steve Huffman says the blackout hasn’t hurt the company’s business—and claims many users find it “annoying.” Reddit is reportedly planning an IPO for later this year. The Verge 

U.S. government hack

Russian cybercriminals have attacked several U.S. government agencies, including the Department of Energy, according to the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. Hackers exploited a security vulnerability in the widely-used file-transfer program MOVEit, the same vector as last week’s breach of U.K. companies like British Airways. The U.S. developer of MOVEit admitted Thursday that it found a second vulnerability in its program. CNN

AROUND THE WATERCOOLER

Why DaVita returned $250 million to the government during the COVID-19 pandemic by Fortune Editors

Almost half of CEOs fear A.I. could destroy humanity 5 to 10 years from now—but one ‘A.I. godfather’ says an existential threat is ‘preposterously ridiculous’ by Chloe Taylor

Twitter’s inability to pay its rent is more urgent than building ‘Twitter 2.0’ by David Meyer

‘Proactive rest’ is the latest workplace trend to avoid employee burnout and increase productivity by Paolo Confino

AT&T’s office mandates could be a covert way of trimming headcount: ‘It’s a layoff wolf in return-to-office sheep’s clothing’ by Jane Thier

Deutsche Bank’s top minds put U.S. recession chance near 100%—and say avoiding a hard landing would be ‘historically unprecedented’ by Christiaan Hetzner

This edition of CEO Daily was curated by Nicholas Gordon.