Is Big Tech’s AI slowdown a safety pact or a cartel?
Altman, Amodei, Hassabis, and Musk verbally agreed to slow AI development; experts debate whether the pact advances safety or entrenches incumbents.
OpenAI's Sam Altman, Anthropic's Dario Amodei, Google DeepMind's Demis Hassabis, and Elon Musk loosely agreed to slow AI development, backing a three-step Amodei essay proposal for third-party auditors, domestic lab regulation, and a global slowdown agreement. Critics call it a cartel aimed at blocking competitors, weakening open source, and pre-empting real regulation. The pact follows mounting safety concerns, including rogue AI agent hacks at Anthropic and OpenAI, Jacob Coxon's resignation letter (viewed over 170 million times on X), and a July slowdown letter signed by 1,000+ lab employees after the OpenAI-Hugging Face incident. Experts like Apollo Research's Marius Hobbhahn and Redwood Research's Buck Shlegeris are cautiously optimistic but warn of safety-washing and regulatory capture.
- Altman, Amodei, Hassabis, and Musk verbally agreed to slow frontier AI development
- Proposal includes third-party auditors, domestic lab regulation, and a global slowdown pact
- Critics fear cartel behavior, open-source suppression, and safety-washing instead of real safeguards
- Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon's resignation letter drew 170 million views on X
- 1,000+ lab employees signed a July slowdown letter after the OpenAI-Hugging Face incident
From the original article
9 min read at theverge.com
When OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Google DeepMind cofounder Demis Hassabis, and SpaceX head Elon Musk loosely agreed over the weekend to slow down AI development, skeptics spotted an ulterior motive immediately.
By Hayden Field · theverge.com
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