How Do You Regulate an Industry You Don’t Understand? | Columbia Magazine

Columbia Magazine has published an article headlined 'How Do You Regulate an Industry You Don't Understand?' The piece notes that many observers, including the editors of the New York Times, have advocated establishing a federal agency to oversee the AI industry. It also states that President Donald J. Trump scuttled plans set in motion by Joseph Biden in 2023 to create federal safety standards for AI and to require government-overseen testing of models before release.

According to the excerpt, the scuttled plans would have created federal safety standards for AI and required government-overseen testing of models before release. The article also quotes an argument that companies need not wait for regulations to decide what safety guardrails to adopt. The excerpt does not name who makes that argument, nor which companies it refers to, and presents the argument without further elaboration.

The excerpt places the proposal for a federal AI agency alongside the removal of the 2023 plans for federal safety standards and pre-release government testing. It does not state what, if anything, has replaced those standards, nor which companies have adopted guardrails without waiting for regulation. The headline poses the question directly; the excerpt's answer set is limited to the two mechanisms it describes — statutory oversight with pre-release testing, and company-level decisions about guardrails taken independently of legislation.