Google, Microsoft seem OK with Colorado’s controversial AI law. Local tech not so much.
The “little tech people” got into heated discussions with a state task force Monday that is revising the law to protect consumers without hurting innovation
Tamara Chuang, The Colorado Sun
Representatives from Google, Microsoft, IBM and other massive technology companies showed up at the State Capitol on Monday to support and make suggestions for Colorado’s controversial artificial intelligence law, which became the first in the nation to pass last spring.
Big Tech seemed more or less OK with the new law, which aims to put guardrails on machines that make major decisions that could alter the fate of any Coloradan. That specifically includes AI used in decisions for jobs, lending or and financial services, health care services, insurance, housing, government or legal service or a spot in college.
But that wasn’t specific enough for a group of local founders who were involved in the most heated discussion during Monday’s Artificial Intelligence Impact Task Force meeting. Their concerns echoed a letter signed by a group of 300 technology executives sent to Gov. Jared Polis a few weeks after he signed Senate Bill 205. Polis pledged to revise the new law and is relying on the task force to figure those things out. A report is due in February.
Luke Swanson, chief technology officer at popular Denver shopping app Ibotta, wondered if cash-rebate offers made to its shoppers are considered “financial services.” Jon Nordmark, a local entrepreneur who founded eBags in the 1990s, said his current company Iterate.ai developed technology for private AI systems. Customers use Iterate’s tech to build and train their own AI systems. For Iterate to be in compliance, they’d have to know everything a customer does, which they don’t. And they couldn’t afford to, even with 100 employees. Most of its employees are tech experts. It just hired its first staff accountant.
Read more from Tamara Chuang at ColoradoSun.com.
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