Who is driving the AI agenda and what do they stand to gain?

From the critical, like law enforcement, healthcare, and humanitarian aid, to the mundane, like dating and shopping, artificial intelligence (AI) seems to be the answer to all our problems. AI is a catch-all phrase for a wide-ranging set of technologies most of which apply learning techniques from statistics to find patterns in large sets of data and make predictions based on those patterns. It seems like there are meetings every other week, organised by representatives from industry, government, academia, and civil society to address the perils of AI and formulate solutions to harness its potential. But who is driving the regulatory agenda and what do they stand to gain? This question needs to be answered because letting industry needs drive the AI agenda presents real risks.