[FergusArgyll]

Can you explain how this is attempted regulatory capture? To start a lab now which can actually compete for the frontier (i.e. and pass the "Threshold of compute" needed to get regulated) a lab / company would need a ton of money. Surely a well funded operation of that kind can deal with the regulations.

[kingstnap]

Well he explicitly calls for regulations that ban open weight models, which of course hugely threaten Anthropic's API business model. If we got a open weight model actually around as good as Opus 4.6 that would be extremely bad for them.

Regulating competitors out of existence like that is textbook regulatory capture.

Dario is also huge on regulations banning Chip exports to China, who are the only other real competitors to US Labs, open weight or not.

Also invariably, such corporations always create regulations that are easier for them and harder for competitors.

[gck1]

You'd need a ton of money if you followed the unoptimized, cash burning mindset of existing AI labs. There's probably a ton of optimization that is just sitting on the table. Chinese labs have proven it can be done for way less money.

Then there's running inference service of open weights, which doesn't necessarily require opening a lab. You can grab Chinese model weights and sell inference.

Anthropic wants to make sure nobody can open a new domestic lab, or provide inference services of unauthorized open weight models, or release open weights if model is good. It is regulatory capture - it covers all areas that are dangers to Anthropic's bottom line.

[thayne]

For one thing, the financial barrier may not necessarily stay that high forever.

For another, such regulations could prevent a competitor from making the weights open for their model to try and disrupt the competition.

And finally, Amodei would no doubt want to be involved in designing the tests the AI needs to pass, and could (and likely would) design it in a way that Anthropic models would be able to pass easier than competing models.