BY MIDNIGHT, all the cookies had been eaten. The vending machine was out of coffee. The sandwiches ordered in for dinner were long gone. Still, about 700 lawmakers remained holed up inside the European Union’s soaring executive chamber in Brussels. Finally, as the sun rose on an icy Dec. 8, 2023, they staggered home to nap and shower before returning for a further 17 hours, until—out of exhaustion or expediency—they agreed on a package of laws about one of the thorniest issues on which they had ever voted: artificial intelligence.
The marathon negotiations over the EU’s AI Act, as it’s now known, were among the most intensive in the bloc’s memory, and produced the world’s first rule book for a sprawling new technology with seismic implications. The EU’s 27 member nations were hardly alone in trying to pull off this legislative feat. President Joe Biden last October issued an executive order, setting out guidelines
