The latest AI bottleneck? The public
Plus a 90-minute lesson with Jensen.
Happy Friday from a tired Tom.
I wrote yesterday that public consent was missing from discussions at Nvidia GTC. Then, as I was at a Q&A with Jensen Huang, a report landed in my inbox from a UK industry task force about exactly this.
Its ideas to win public trust for AI infrastructure will not be everyone’s cup of tea — local councils keeping all business rates from data centres, for example — but it’s a start for the industry to realise that a lack of public support has become a bottleneck which it can’t engineer its way out of.
Economic growth is Britain’s priority, but it is easy to overlook how much of our economy is built on small businesses.
According to Shopify, UK businesses on its platform generated more than £70 billion of economic activity last year and supported 479,000 jobs. Its data also shows UK exports are booming.
These insights are published on Shopify’s new global data hub, The Entrepreneur Effect.
For anyone working on the growth or tech agenda, it offers a useful look at where jobs are actually coming from.
Happening Next Week 📆
The Cyber Security and Resilience Bill is back in Parliament on Monday, giving the Lords their first chance to react to government amendments to make companies report AI safety incidents. For many peers, it doesn't go far enough, and some will push their own amendments. MPs, meanwhile, will debate the “Emerging risks of advanced AI” on Monday afternoon.
Wednesday is Budget Day, with John Healey delivering his statement at 12:30pm. On Thursday, the Lords are asking about AI startups' business confidence and Ofcom’s categorised services register under the Online Safety Act.
In today's edition:
🇬🇧 Britain’s AI ambitions have hit another bottleneck — the public
🤔 Contrarian takes with Jensen Huang
🆘 The CMA holds "urgent" talks with Meta about publishers' content fears
