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by formerly_proven 22 days ago
It took me quite some time to realize what an utterly presumptuous product name Claude Code actually is, but only because Shannon is rarely mentioned with his first name. It's golden calf levels of hubris, even more so if you consider how incapable it was on release. It's like renaming calc.exe Einstein. Incredibly poor taste, but entirely in line with AI tech bro mentality.
2 comments
kstrauser 22 days ago
That linkage never occurred to me, or, I suspect, them. Claude use to be a reasonably common name. I have an uncle Claude. Why do you believe they named it after Shannon in particular?
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homebrewer 22 days ago
It seems to be a widely repeated "fact" which can't be traced to anything particularly authoritative:

https://archive.is/pt5fQ

https://britannica.com/topic/Claude-AI

Looks like the 2023 NYT article started it, and it uses this as reference:

> depending on which employee you ask, was either a nerdy tribute to the 20th-century mathematician Claude Shannon

Personally I always associated it with the silent protagonist from GTA3.

https://gta.fandom.com/wiki/Claude

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bombcar 21 days ago
Salesforce spent some amount of money to license the name Einstein from his estate/heirs.
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