Governor Gavin Newsom signed an executive order to speed up two AI laws he recently signed. It also calls for experts to weigh bigger changes by mid-November. Newsom pointed to one idea in an Instagram video.
"Advancing efforts to create an emergency shut-off, otherwise known as an AI kill switch, which means a lot of things depending on who you talk to," said Newsom. "So we want to flesh out exactly what that means and how to come up with a framework that works."
But not everyone thinks the order does much. Adam Kovacevich heads the Chamber of Progress, a center-left tech-industry group.
"What Governor Newsom is mostly doing is trying to show that he's jumping on the issue of the moment by saying something, " said Kovacevich, "but ultimately it doesn't really do very much. It's not actually creating a kill switch for the internet. It's asking a group of experts to explore that issue as well as others."
Kovacevich also says people are focused elsewhere.
"Even though AI is raising in salience as a political issue," he added, "it's still not in the top 10 of voters' concerns. Voters are still primarily concerned with cost of living, healthcare, crime, education."
The recommendations are due November 16th. Much of what happens next will fall to Newsom's successor.