My lived experience with tech companies is that principles are easy when they're free - i.e., when you're telling others what to do, or taking principled stances when a competitor is not breathing down your neck.

So, with all respect, when someone tells me that the people they worked with were well-intentioned and driven by values, I take it with a grain of salt. Been there, said the same things, and then when the company needed to make tough calls, it all fell apart.

However, in this instance, it does seem that Anthropic is walking away from money. I think that, in itself, is a pretty strong signal that you might be right.

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clutter55561 an hour ago | parent | next [-]

HN is pretty polarised about this - they are either “the good guys” or “doing it for positive marketing”.

I’m on the camp “the world is so fucked up, take the good when you can find it”.

Beggars can’t be choosers when it comes to taking a stand against dictatorships.

	▲	abustamam an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Yeah, the alternative is be OK with their product being used for surveillance. Not sure why it's controversial that they said no, regardless of the reasoning. Yeah there's a lot of marketing speak and things to cover their asses. Let's call them out on that later. Right now let's applaud them for doing the right thing. FWIW I do not think they are the "good guys" (if I had a dollar for every company that had a policy of not being evil...). But they are certainly not siding with the bad guys here.
	▲	twelvechairs 16 minutes ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		No surprises many people on YCs site align with Sam Altmans view of the world - right or wrong.

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mkozlows 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I think it's definitely true that you should never count on a company to do principled things forever. But that doesn't mean that nothing is real or good.

Like Google's support for the open web: They very sincerely did support it, they did a lot of good things for it. And then later, they decided that they didn't care as much. It was wrong to put your faith in them forever, but also wrong to treat that earlier sincerity as lies.

In this case, Anthropic was doing a good thing, and they got punished for it, and if you agree with their stand, you should take their side.

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ajam1507 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> However, in this instance, it does seem that Anthropic is walking away from money.

The supply chain risk designation will be overturned in court, and the financial fallout from losing the government contracts will pale in comparison to the goodwill from consumers. Not to mention that giving in would mean they lose lots of their employees who would refuse to work under those terms. In this case, the principles are less than free.

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Stratoscope an hour ago | parent | next [-]

> ...the financial fallout from losing the government contracts will pale in comparison to the goodwill from consumers.

In fact, a friend heard about this and immediately signed up for a $200/year Claude Pro plan. This is someone who has been only a very occasional user of ChatGPT and never used Claude before.

I told my friend "You could just sign up for the free plan and upgrade after you try it out."

"No, I want to send them this tangible message of support right now!"

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skissane 21 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> The supply chain risk designation will be overturned in court,

I'm honestly uncertain how the courts will rule. You could be right, but it isn't guaranteed. I think a judicial narrowing of it is more likely than a complete overturn.

OTOH, I think almost guaranteed it will be watered-down by the government. Because read expansively, it could force Microsoft and AWS to choose between stopping reselling Claude vs dropping the Pentagon as a customer. I don't think Hegseth actually wants to put them in that position – he probably honestly doesn't realise that's what he's potentially doing. In any event, Microsoft/AWS/etc's lobbyists will talk him out of it.

And the more the government waters it down, the greater the likelihood the courts will ultimately uphold it.

> and the financial fallout from losing the government contracts will pale in comparison to the goodwill from consumers.

Maybe. The problem is B2B/enterprise is arguably a much bigger market than B2C. And the US federal contracting ban may have a chilling effect on B2B firms who also do business with the federal government, who may worry that their use of Claude might have some negative impact on their ability to win US federal deals, and may view OpenAI/xAI (and maybe Google too) as safer options.

I guess the issue is nobody yet knows exactly how wide or narrow the US government is going to interpret their "ban on Anthropic". And even if they decide to interpret it relatively narrowly, there is always the risk they might shift to a broader reading in the future. Possibly, some of Anthropic's competitors may end up quietly lobbying behind the scenes for the Trump admin to adopt broader readings of it.

	▲	ajam1507 12 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		> OTOH, I think almost guaranteed it will be watered-down by the government. Because read expansively, it could force Microsoft and AWS to choose between stopping reselling Claude vs dropping the Pentagon as a customer. A tweet does not have the force of law. Being designated a supply chain risk does not mean that companies who do business with the government cannot do business with Anthropic. Hegseth is just has the law wrong. The government does not have the power to prevent companies from doing business with Anthropic.

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aoeusnth1 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Unclear how much damage the designation will do to their dealmaking ability in the meantime. How long will it take for the court to reverse order?

	▲	altairprime an hour ago \| parent [-]
		The longer it takes, the better the impact on their reputation.

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mech422 an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

The consumer goodwill is working then - it pushed me to upgrade my plan on march 1st... (do they bill on rolling 30 day cycle ? or calendar-month to calendar-month?)

	▲	heroh an hour ago \| parent [-]
		It’s not rolling 30 days. Lost 2 days of use by subscribing in February.

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conartist6 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

That's what worries me so much about the development that OpenAI is stepping in. OpenAI's claim is that they have the same principles as Anthropic, but that claim is easy because it's free now because the govt wants to sell the "old bad, new good" story.

Surely OpenAI cannot but notice that those values, held firmly, make you an enemy of the state?

	▲	mojoe an hour ago \| parent [-]
		My reading is that OpenAI is paying lip service. Altman is basically saying "OF COURSE we don't want to spy on Americans or murderdrone randos, but OF COURSE the government would never do that, they just told me so (except for the fact that they just cut ties with Anthropic because Anthropic wouldn't let them do that)"

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cperciva 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

principles are easy when they're free

Indeed. If everything is a priority, nothing is a priority; you only know that something is a real priority when you get an answer to the question "what will you sacrifice for this".

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rustystump 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I call this being ethically convenient. I think anthropic is playing to the crowd. This admin will be gone soon enough so no need dragging the brand into mud. Just need to hold out. They have enough money that walking away from the money isnt impressive. But pissing off the gov is pretty fun and far more interesting.

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benny20twenty 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[dead]