In the grand scheme of things, the gov claiming a perpetual 21%+ of all income of AI (all) companies is not all that different from owning a small percent of said AI companies. The financials and even incentives are basically the same.

It's somewhat entertaining to watch both sides argue about this as if it's some major difference when both are actually aligned on wanting bigger gov and more gov ownership/control of corps (one party via taxes the other wants it direct).

This is theory. If we look at the real world, do sovereign wealth funds typically invest in cigarettes? I don't think so. I think they typically have more stringent ethical guidelines than most regular funds.

I'm typically not in favor of sovereign wealth funds anyway. Because I don't buy the idea that the free market is always more efficient than the public sector, and if that's the case then investing the funds in the public sector, schools and improving health and social outcomes, is better than buying SpaceX even if they're going to the moon.

Of course there are exceptions.. if a country has more money than they know what to do with, it makes sense to pile it.

> the governments don’t like to do things that could potentially harm their investments. If a government has large stakes in cigarette companies, they’re going to be resistant to regulate them.

The ideal in a democracy would be that we behave as adults and make the decision where to draw the lines.

...and yeah, corruption is a problem, but it's going to find a way regardless of what we throw at it. We would be better off handling the existing corruption than worrying about some hypothetical future corruption as a reason we can't try new things.

Doesn't need to be the S&P. Can simply be the entire market float market share weighted

There's a reason every country with a sovereign wealth fund is a dictatorship, its a really handy way to launder money, steal. Which is why Trump wants it.

It's common in AI writing because it's common in human writing. Juxtaposition is a useful rhetorical flourish.

Isn't it usually "it's not just x, it's y"? As in, it's X but even more than X.

The title has the opposite meaning: it's not X, but it's Y.

Yeah, the subject is AI, so you try to get a crashingly obvious AI trope in there somewhere. Those are the rules.

(Disclaimer: didn't read the article. It's paywalled.)

In general news paper article writers don't pick the title of their own article, it's someone else picking it for engagement (maybe using AI).

Also, FT is too big to not be aware of AI writing, and to not have internal checks (Pangram, ...)

AI speak infects human language now, people start to talk like LLMs.

> A doesn't belong to category X, it belongs to category Y.

FTFY. If you confuse ∈ for =, that's on you.

AI;DR* they want to build data centers in other countries that are less able to resist their construction. This consumes water and electricity of the host county. The central thesis is that if the less-than-willing exploitation of foreign resources for the enrichment of the more powerful country is imperialism, then this is a form of imperialism.

* The clunky turns of phrase and jarring introduction of analogies reads strongly of Claude to me, at least

anything that gives US an advantage in any market/competitive arena is basically imperialist.

Gift article - https://giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/actions/redeem/71bd10...

But basically, the argument is that a government shouldn't accrue and own appreciating assets mixed with AI skepticism.

The purpose of any technology is to expand one's powers, and whatever those powers expand to is conquested. Bronze was imperialist but iron was more imperialist, and gunpowder was more imperialist than that. Oil was even more imperialist and now chips and AI are having a go at it. Even the harnessing of fire and the cultivation of spoken language was imperialist, and a necessary step towards today's AI boom. It's the the latest ring to rule them all.