zlacker

>>meetpa+(OP)
I really hope Anthropic turns out to be one of the 'good guys', or at least a net positive.

It appears they trend in the right direction:

- Have not kissed the Ring.

- Oppose blocking AI regulation that other's support (e.g. They do not support banning state AI laws [2]).

- Committing to no ads.

- Willing to risk defense department contract over objections to use for lethal operations [1]

The things that are concerning: - Palantir partnership (I'm unclear about what this actually is) [3]

- Have shifted stances as competition increased (e.g. seeking authoritarian investors [4])

It inevitable that they will have to compromise on values as competition increases and I struggle parsing the difference marketing and actually caring about values. If an organization cares about values, it's suboptimal not to highlight that at every point via marketing. The commitment to no ads is obviously good PR but if it comes from a place of values, it's a win-win.

I'm curious, how do others here think about Anthropic?

[1]https://archive.is/Pm2QS

[2]https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/05/opinion/anthropic-ceo-reg...

[3]https://investors.palantir.com/news-details/2024/Anthropic-a...

[4]https://archive.is/4NGBE

>>Johnny+mE
Being the 'good guy' is just marketing. It's like a unique selling point for them. Even their name alludes to it. They will only keep it up as long as it benefits them. Just look at the comments from their CEO about taking Saudi money.

Not that I've got some sort of hate for Anthropic. Claude has been my tool of choice for a while, but I trust them about as much as I trust OpenAI.

>>mrdepe+t31
How do you parse the difference between marketing and having values? I have difficulty with that and I would love to understand how people can be confident one way or the other. In many instances, the marketing becomes so disconnected from actions that it's obvious. That hasn't happen with Anthropic for me.

>>Johnny+Or1
I am a fairly cynical person. Anthropic could have made this statement at any time, but they chose to do it when OpenAI says they are going to start showing ads, so view it in that context. They are saying this to try to get people angry about ads to drop OpenAI and move to Anthropic. For them, not having ads supports their current objective.

When you accept the amount of investments that these companies have, you don't get to guide your company based on principles. Can you imagine someone in a boardroom saying, "Everyone, we can't do this. Sure it will make us a ton of money, but it's wrong!" Don't forget, OpenAI had a lot of public goodwill in the beginning as well. Whatever principles Dario Amodei has as an individual, I'm sure he can show us with his personal fortune.

Parsing it is all about intention. If someone drops coffee on your computer, should you be angry? It depends on if they did it on purpose, or it was an accident. When a company posts a statement that ads are incongruous to their mission, what is their intention behind the message?

>>mrdepe+UA1
> Anthropic could have made this statement at any time, but they chose to do it when OpenAI says they are going to start showing ads, so view it in that context.

Obviously they did do it for that reason, but it does make sense. They've positioned themselves from day 1 as the AI company built on more values; that doesn't make them good but it's self-consistent. If, out of the blue earlier on when nobody was talking about ads in AI, they said "we're not going to put ads in AI", that would have been a Suspiciously Specific Denial: "our shirt saying we're not going to put ads in AI has people asking a lot of questions already answered by our shirt".

> Can you imagine someone in a boardroom saying, "Everyone, we can't do this. Sure it will make us a ton of money, but it's wrong!"

Yes. But that's not how you'd say it. "First of all, this would go against our established ethical principles, which you knew when you invested with us. Second, those ethical principles define our position in the market, which we should not abandon."