Setting aside the “bug”, the intended functionality is effectively an insurance policy taken out by Anthropic to cover their downside, but paid for by users.

This one sided type of embedded insurance is not unique to Anthropic, but sharply increasing cost, layered on top of the self righteousness, seems to be making the stench unbearable over the past year.

I used to think of Anthropic as the good guys, and I don’t doubt they still sincerely hold that view of themselves, but I think I prefer Sam Altman’s version.

His brand of self righteousness was convincing at first but eventually he started to turn to the camera and wink, like in House of Cards, to let us know.. he knew that we knew. And then, for me anyway, it became more mundane and less offensive.

When Dario and crew go out and profess, as they have for years now, that if we could only see the thing that’s a few months away, we would all realize how doomed knowledge work and national security are…

..and then continue to release software so buggy and shitty that they have to do biweekly HN apology tours, I begin to miss the wink at the camera.

Yeah, this implementation and their behavior these past few weeks is especially laughable when you consider that they consider themselves “philosopher programmers” or whatever.

You would think they’d be more reflective and introspective about these brash moral decisions. Their product quality is akin to my CS capstone lab group.