Amid AI Shakeup, Trump Names Big Tech Advisory Panel

President Trump formed a 13-member technology and science advisory panel with some of the major business leaders taking a seat to guide the direction of AI policy and other related issues. 

David Sacks, who has served as White House AI and crypto czar, and Michael Kratsios, a technology adviser, will co-chair the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), the White House said.

Panel members include Google cofounder Sergey Brin, Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Oracle Executive Chairman Larry Ellison, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.

Dell Technologies founder Michael Dell and Oracle Executive Vice Chair of Oracle Board Safra Catz also were named to the council on Wednesday that could ultimately include 24 people, according to an executive order.

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Under the guidance of Trump, the panel will focus on opportunities and challenges from emerging technologies related to the American workforce. PCAST will disband two from the date of the order unless extended by the Trump.

Appointments to the panel come one day after a New Mexico jury found that Meta Platforms violated state consumer protection law. The judge ordered Meta Platforms to pay $375 million in civil penalties due to misleading users about the safety of its platforms and enabling child sexual exploitation.

While the ruling specifically points to Meta Platforms an not to Zuckerberg individually, it does relate to user safety and child exploitation rather than AI.

New Mexico jurors sided with state prosecutors who argued Meta prioritized profits over safety, and violated parts of the state's Unfair Practices Act.

Some companies have experienced major challenges with AI. For example, OpenAI today announced it will shutter its Sora video-generation tool, which launched February 2024 -- a decision that ended a high-profile media deal with Walt Disney that had committed to take a $1 billion stake in the AI company as part of a three-year licensing partnership.

It would have allowed users to create short-form videos based on Disney characters and content, more than 200 animated or creature characters from Disney, Marvel, Pixar, and Star Wars.

A post on the social-media platform X did not explain why OpenAI decided to shutter the AI-video generation platform, only that it wrote about saying "goodbye to Sora. To everyone who created with Sora, shared it, and built community around it: thank you... We’ll share more soon.”

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