> probably GPT 5.6 will be better than Opus 4.8 and they won't hype it up as too dangerous to release before releasing it.

If you buy the story that Anthropic's marketing hype drove US regulation, then I have a bridge to sell you.

The best case real reason is Anthropic pissed off the administration.

Which will leave OpenAI, Google, Meta, and X far more vulnerable to government data sharing requests... and KYC identity is incredibly valuable to mandate for those.

That is my best guess too, which is an even better case for better-than-Opus-4.8 models being available from OpenAI without drawing the attention of the administration.

I do think their marketing hype was a factor though even in this narrative. Andrew Jassy tells a vengeful admin that there's this jailbreak for a model Anthropic said was dangerous, and vengeful admin seizes the opportunity to take vengeance.