Join the discussion
Write your take first — we'll ask for email only when you're ready to publish.
- Hacker News
- There was a guy in the comments of the first article on this topic, who claimed to be an expert on this law and was adamant that the decision by the Trump admin was perfectly legal.
Not just for accountability sake, but if that gentleman could come back in here and outline what he thinks is going on that would be quite interesting.
by protocolture - You can hear the Department of War's pov on this controversy from the All-In Podcast here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzwRflcLPAA&t=2479s
Super interesting pov from the person who recommended the supply risk designation.
by RoloBaron - It’s possible this could go before multiple judges who won’t all agree with this particular one.by swingboy
- IANAL, so I can't comment on the legal merits of any of it.
From a practical/business perspective, I can see the government's position. It's very simple and it makes sense. Here's an analogy that I think is apt:
We use Solidworks, Altium Designer and JetBrains tools for our work. Imagine a scenario where each of these companies has license terms that restrict their use to certain domains or types of products they --for whatever reason; it does not have to be political-- do not agree with. Further imagine that the restrictions are different for each product, creating a virtual mine field of sorts.
Now imagine that every supplier adopts this philosophy over time; hardware, software, tools, components, fabricators, contractors, consultants, etc.
Well, very soon you will have to conclude that the only job you will be able to do is drive for Uber, if that.
The DoD/DoW is massive and massively multidisciplinary. They simply cannot afford to have vendors create no-go mine fields for them. It quickly becomes an unmanageable pain in the ass.
So, yeah, under those circumstances, I would not touch Anthropic with a ten foot pole duct-taped to another ten foot pole. It simply would not be a reasonable decision to work with them.
by robomartin - Which is very different to labelling them a national security risk instead of just not awarding them contracts.
- If Domino's Pizza offered to deliver pizza to the Pentagon but declined in their terms of service to deliver pizza-box-shaped packages to Tehran, do you think it would be a fair and proportionate response for the DoD to ban anyone in the defense supply chain from ever ordering pizza from Domino's?
- It's entirely reasonable for the USG to say "we don't want to use a product with guardrails". Plenty of people have gotten annoyed with Fable and done exactly that!
But to prohibit anyone else from using it is a much bigger and more questionable step.
by cperciva - Do judicial rulings have much effect on this administration anymore? It feels a bit like the judges are goalies trying to block penalty shots, and this administration just keeps kicking balls at the goal, and eventually something gets in ... because the judicial system itself is a bit stochastic.
- It was a master stroke in international politics though, the US created an arms race towards sovereign ai, small models, and self-hosting - exactly like they wanted to.
(sarcasm intended)
by bushido - Similarly the war created unstoppable momentum towards decarbonization.by dboreham
- Truly a flawless strategy: convince every government and large company on earth that depending on US-hosted AI is a geopolitical risk.by SwtCyber
- The Iran war and SoH crisis has been great for EV uptake outside of the US. In combination with the US AI apartheid, it has been a huge boost for Chinese EVs and Chinese AI adoption.by angry_octet
- At this point, does precedent even matter? Based on recent rulings, I feel like this exact scenario could play out again and the result would be the exact same.by hingler36
- So can they now sue the government and recoup their inflated theoretical losses to be paid out of tax revenue? It feels like any outcome here will have no negative effect on the major players actually involved.by frog42
- s/out of tax revenue/with public money/
This is the federal government. When they collect taxes it is the minus operation that corresponds to the plus operation when they spent it initially.
by dools - If they what they missed out on was selling the government tokens at a loss ... do they now have to pay the government the value of what they would have lost? :Pby nullc
- Good for Anthropic for standing up for themselves but think of the masses of companies that decided not to take the risk. The tone was definitely set at Trump's inauguration with all the tech execs front and center on display. They knew that if they didn't play ball Trump would use government power against them.
Law firms blackmailed into doing pro bono work for Trump's pet causes, intelligence analysts not able to tell the truth, energy companies giving up wind leases and switching to fossil fuels. And of course the constant shakedowns for cash.
by thinkcontext - > They knew that if they didn't play ball Trump would use government power against them.
And that friends, is capital-F Fascism.
by heylook - It's a shame companies like Google immediately folded instead of standing with them. https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/iKm2FhpWkuuBojm82/why-i-left...
In his recent interview Emil Michael (DoW undersecretary, "AI czar") even mentions that the Anthropic case served as motivation for Google folding.
It is a shame that Google's leadership is so spineless. On the minuscule off-chance any of those VPs are reading HN - you are bad and you should feel shame for increasing x-risk for a percentage point of profit.
by solenoid0937 - > energy companies giving up wind leases and switching to fossil fuels
If only it were them "giving up" leases -- we *paid them billions* to halt developments.
- Judge rules horse must return to barn.by Arubis
- The law is too slow. It's like a horse carriage in the age of twitter. Why can't they expedite for special cases? Not even defending Antropic or any company. Just that if a tweet can cause damage in seconds, the law shouldn't be too far behind.by firefoxd
- "The wheels of justice turns slowly but grinds finely". Oof!
- You are right and yet I continue to be impressed by a court system that can deliver judgment in 3 months whereas in the Netherlands nothing happens in under a year and complex cases always last more than five.by kaon_2
- That's why the exploit of a social media savvy government is to overflow the system with so much slop (literally and figuratively) the law can never catch up. Your bug is their feature.by avaer
- In the age of "Twitter"? Why Twitter specifically, not the internet or social media? I honestly feel like Twitter is losing relevance. I learned about it from TikTok for what its worth, and then read more about it here on HN. I've never understood why people put Twitter on a pedestal that I feel it doesn't deserve. Though aside from that your point stands and I totally agree with you. In reality people's/companies' constitutional rights can be infringed easily and the courts take months or even years to stop said infringement.by rzz3
- I thought I hated Web 2.0/3.0, but "age of twitter" made me actually feel ill.by frog42
- Mostly, the law is not creating the right incentives. In this case in particular, I don't think it's so much a matter of speed: I suspect the current US admin would still sow the chaos they do to the same degree if it was ruled illegal within a week instead of within months.by jstummbillig
- > Why can't they expedite for special cases?
To a certain extent this exists, but given that SCOTUS has been stacked with GOPers…
> The shadow docket is a break from ordinary procedure. Such cases receive very limited briefings and are typically decided a week or less after an application is filed. The process generally results in short, unsigned rulings. In contrast, merits cases take months, include extensive briefing and public oral argument, and result in lengthy written opinions detailing the reasoning of the majority and of any concurring and dissenting justices.
by throw0101a - Presumably this is going to lead to anthropic getting a big payday from the US gov for all the time their flagship product was banned and all the users they lost due to it