The choice of Cape Town-born Sacks as 'AI and Crypto Czar' sends a very clear message from the incoming administration that AI and crypto are the two most important technologies in the country (if not the world), important enough to justify a specific and unusual White House appointment.
On 5 December, president-elect Donald Trump announced the appointment of Cape Town-born David Sacks as "AI and Crypto Czar" for his incoming administration. There has already been some reporting around the outsized power of ex-South Africans in US politics, technology, and media (including this roundup from Rebecca Davis), which has covered a number of Saffer-spawn such as Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Joel Pollak, Roelof Botha, and others.
Sacks's new appointment elevates him to the top ranks of national influence but his South African origins are less interesting than the nature of the appointment, which has alternately raised eyebrows and drawn praise from various sections of the commentariat.
The title itself bears some discussion. One wonders about its genesis in the US where, presumably, Russian nouns are not much favoured in the White House. In any event, "czars" are not new to modern American politics.
Over the past couple of decades there has been a drug czar, a terrorism czar, an Aids czar, an inflation czar, a border czar and even a car czar (in the Nineties, when the US car industry was near-dead).
The first Russian czar,...
