Many critiques and defenses of @sama and @OpenAI right now seem to be talking past each other. I think at least three issues need to be separated: the substance of the deal, the timing, and the messaging. On substance: OpenAI appears to have accepted "all lawful uses" language with assurances that current law and policy rule out mass surveillance and autonomous weapons, rather than requiring explicit contractual commitments. They also appear to have deferred to the government's definitions rather than stipulating definitions that cover novel capabilities — like sifting through legally procured data at scale. The details are still unknown, but based on public statements, I lean towards Anthropic on both counts. That said, I can see reasonable arguments on the other side. On timing: The government had just declared a competitor a supply chain risk — a designation normally reserved for foreign adversaries — on transparently disingenuous and unacceptable grounds. Here I feel more strongly that OpenAI is in the wrong. There are times for competition and times for solidarity, and this was a clear time for solidarity. Signing a deal mere hours later, whatever its merits on substance, undermined the entire industry's ability to push back against government overreach. That matters for principled and long-term pragmatic reasons alike. On messaging: Sam's statement was, at best, confusing. Many people struggled to determine how OpenAI's deal differed from Anthropic's proposal. Had Sam written something like: "We accepted roughly the compromise that Anthropic rejected, because we trust the government not to use AI for mass surveillance or automated weapons, and in any case we view such matters as up to public officials, not private companies," I would have disagreed, but I would have at least respected the straightforwardness. Instead his statement seemed designed to obscure and mislead. If I were an OpenAI employee, I would not be thrilled that a taxonomy needs to be created to clarify how the company is being critiqued and defended. But here we are. Do with this what you wish!