Editing AI Governance DAO (section)

== Background ==
Every tool is used to increase or diminish humanity. When hominids first used sticks to extend their reach, they discovered a new opportunity to defend their band from predators and increase their power to acquire food. The first spear was also used to oppress the band of hominids violently. Every tool can be used to support, defend, and promote human flourishing. And every tool can be used to undermine, attack, and oppress humanity. 

AI is a new tool that is disrupting human society on a scale previously unimagined. Machine learning has transformed the way people interact with their world. The Google search engine has given people powers of understanding their world that would embarrass the gods of Greece. Humans are now faster than Hermes was ever described. Google Maps has made average humans more knowledgeable of local geography and economics than Athena. 

Machine learning and neural networks are different than other tools in their global effect. The sweeping interconnection of web communication aggregates global information more effectively than any national intelligence agency has ever before aspired. These tools effectively exploit this information to address any problem posed in ways that surprise us with their effectiveness and creativity. Contemporary AI tools such as ChatGPT and DALL-E 2 have put this power in the hands of anyone with a cell phone. The use of new and future AI innovations anticipates tools which can solve complex problems with minimal human prompting, mimicking the most sophisticated behavior of humans. The promise and threat that these tools pose to humanity cannot be overstated.  

The current state of academic understanding of AI is disappointing. Previous technologies, such as electricity and nuclear power, had been anticipated by science in a manner that allowed greater time for deliberation about its deployment. Nevertheless the application of those technologies have led to negative outcomes. The globally networked application of AI technology has the potential to be even more powerful and dangerous to society than any previous technology, and so demands careful deliberation on the wise deployment of the tools that are arising.  

Like any tool, AI cannot be simply suppressed. We don't have the governmental structures to achieve that in our current global societies. Perhaps that is for the best, since as it allows us the freedom to develop openly. However, for such powerful tools, it is essential that development happens in a wisely regulated manner. Wise regulation is a matter of carefully monitoring its development and guiding it in directions which serve our values.

aiGovDAO will seek to govern the development of AI tools broadly, and will have specific protocols for each type of AI research. The most effective way to guide the development of a technology is to be the primary developer. To attract the best developers, the aiGovDAO should pay the the best wages available. To do that, the aiGovDAO should lead the market for AI tools. The plan for controlling the market is to provide free services and tools that are beneficial to humanity broadly (Phase 1, described below), and to charge fees for specialized applications which align with the DAO's values (Phase 2). In the inevitable cases where AI tools emerge which conflict with our values, we will develop freely available tools which police the use of those malign tools (see Phase 1). 

=== Decentralization ===
Many groups are aware of the threat to humanity of technological disruption. And every major center for development of AI has instituted some process for analyzing the ethics of their deployment of the technology, to a greater or lesser degree. However, almost all of these major initiatives are centralized, since the major power behind AI development is for-profit exploitation of the technology.

Therefore, unfortunately, at the moment, the ultimate values and goals that are guiding the development of AI are largely limited to monetary profit. Because of the centralized corporate deployment of the leading AI tools, a primary application of AI today is to improve the effectiveness of advertising. This is having negative effects on society as social media is being engineered to increase engagement at the expense of social harmony.

Further, we cannot establish wise regulation for such a complex problem as AI governance without improving our governance mechanisms, without improving democracy and human communication.

aiGovDAO uses the structure of DAOs to foster collaboration to develop AI tools in the service of the common good. Decentralized organization is used to empower as many people as possible who are conscious of the problem and wise with respect the the consequences of governing the progress of AI. We use the architecture of a DAO to filter information at the edge, to promote the best ideas from the globe to guide the development of AI.

A decentralized AI stack includes research and tooling conversations around data storage, compute, hardware, AI models, and governance. Therefore, in alignment with the goal of decentralizing the governance of AI, we center our focus on the use of small processors<ref>Large NNs dominate public attention. They currently are superior to small NNs, yet are inaccessible to the average researcher due to limitations on shared compute time on the few large networks. This perspective argues against the success of a decentralized AI governance group. But it is not insurmountable. 

Small NNs are surprisingly powerful, even today with the limited attention they have been given. Small NNs can be competitive with--even superior to--large models, since they allow more experimentation from a greater number of researchers. See, e.g., [https://www.semianalysis.com/p/google-we-have-no-moat-and-neither?open=false#%C2%A7large-models-arent-more-capable-in-the-long-run-if-we-can-iterate-faster-on-small-models this discussion]. And the processing power available to P2P networks exceeds that held in centrally owned corporations.</ref>, P2P networks, open source principles, the use of transparent training data, and democratic decision making.