Tesla CEO Elon Musk says social media, artificial intelligence should be regulated
Update: Watch Gayle King's full report Friday, April 13, 2018 on "CBS This Morning," which airs 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. ET/PT.
Amid the firestorm surrounding Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's Senate hearing, we asked another Silicon Valley titan, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, about the Facebook controversy during an interview Tuesday in California.
"Do you think now is the time for regulations in Silicon Valley?" "CBS This Morning" co-host Gayle King asked.
"I think whenever something is – whenever there's something that affects the public good then there does need to be some form of public oversight. … I do think there should be some regulations on AI. I think there should be regulations on social media to the degree that it negatively affects the public good," Musk said. "We can't have like willy-nilly proliferation of fake news, that's crazy. You can't have more types of fake news than real news. That's allowing public deception to go unchecked. That's crazy."
Musk said Tesla takes steps to keep its customer data private.
The CEO said he's also feeling the pressure to meet production goals for the Model 3. Last week, Tesla predicted it would produce about 5,000 of the vehicles a week by the end of June. The company has struggled to meet previous goals, and Musk knows there are high expectations.
"I definitely feel stress, yeah. It's like – we've been incredibly difficult and painful the last several months," Musk said.
"Painful?" King asked.
"Absolutely, of course. Yeah, I'm sleeping on the factory floor, not because I think that's a fun place to sleep. You know. Terrible," he said.
"Sleeping on the factory floor, doing – why are you doing that?"
"Because I don't have time to go home and shower," Musk responded.
"It's that simple?"
"Yes," Musk said. "I don't believe like people should be experiencing hardship while the CEO is like off on vacation."
Musk is still optimistic about where Tesla is headed. Friday on "CBS This Morning," Musk will give us the first-ever look inside the production line for Model 3, Tesla's first mass-market vehicle. He'll also show us how the company is paving its way out of "production hell."