Thread

1. ApolloFortyNine · 1790356118 · focus · HN ↗

   I know everyone says this is political but it actually seems like a textbook designation. Anthropic wanted to have rules on how the military used AI, the military said no and therefore doesn't want anthropic used anywhere in their supply line.

   This is like a pen manufacturer not wanting their pens used to sign drone strike orders, now the military needs to have a special box of pens that don't have stipulations attached. With AI usage it would be the same thing except applied to entire product chains. It seems like it would just add more complexity to operations.

   You can agree with the rules anthropic wanted, but having rules set by a private company at all that apply to the military does seem fair for the military to object to.

   >The Department reasonably feared that Anthropic might manipulate Claude’s design to prevent it from performing national-security functions that the Department deems contractually authorized and necessary

   Though they'd probably put the DoD on the cybersecurity whitelist today, the very idea of the claude whitelists for certain functionality already exists and is being used by them today.

   1. comnetxr · 1790361804 · focus · HN ↗

      I think the better analogy is an insane nuclear power plant manager deciding it wants to buy pens to use as neutron-flux regulator rods — because after all, a pen is functionally a pencil and a pencil is made of graphite.

      Then the pen manufacturer hears about this and says “Our pens are not made of graphite and are not suitable to be used in nuclear reactors”, to which the reactor owner says “it’s fine, they fit in the graphite rod holes, and we’re just using until the next generation of pens come out which will do an even better job”, and then the pen manufacturer says “I’m not going to sell you any pens until you agree that they will be used only writing.”

      1. mitthrowaway2 · 1790367377 · focus · HN ↗

         The previous power plant manager had, of course, already signed a contract agreeing to those terms; the power plant is subsequently under new management and upset about being bound by this contract, so they designate that none of their suppliers of parts and fuel are allowed to have any commercial dealings with the pen manufacturer or use these pens for any purpose, even writing.

         1. rayiner · 1790384156 · focus · HN ↗

            That's not accurate. DOD suppliers weren't banned from having "any commercial dealings" with Anthropic. They were banned from using Anthropic for their work with the DOD.

            1. moron4hire · 1790386003 · focus · HN ↗

               The way things work, the CIOs and CSOs of these companies just implement blanket bans, so it really is effectively a ban for any use. Source: I am at one such company.
            2. kalkin · 1790394972 · focus · HN ↗

               That's true legally, but the government's public statements did initially very explicitly present this as a ban on any dealing.

               "Anthropic a Supply-Chain Risk to National Security. Effective immediately, no contractor, supplier, or partner that does business with the United States military may conduct any commercial activity with Anthropic."

               Presumably, according to the defenders of the designation in this thread, this was an innocent mistake that doesn't indicate any political intent.

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