Futurism/Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images
There’s no love lost between Sam Altman and Dario Amodei.
At the India AI Summit in New Delhi on Thursday, the respective CEOs of OpenAI and Athropic joined about a dozen other industry and political leaders, including the country’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on stage. As they filed into the crowd, PM Modi beckoned them to join hands and raise them above their heads to show a united front.
Other than rivals Altman and Amodei, they did not follow suit. Instead of holding hands, they mostly avoid looking at each other, making awkward eye contact only fleetingly, with Amodei scanning his surroundings as if to say, “Who, me?” If this gesture were in a different kind of setting, it would be praised as a great comedic performance. In the end, both Altman and Amodei chose to raise closed fists instead of clenched hands.
As one Redditor described it, it was a “disgusting masterpiece.” Amodei didn’t seem particularly excited. Altman looked confused, holding his free hand in front of his chest as he awaited Amodei’s final decision.
It heightened what was already an absurd spectacle. Promising a utopia on the horizon, industry leaders smiled and held hands as if playing in a rose-tinted ring, showing support for a prime minister widely criticized as an authoritarian.
The conflict between OpenAI and Anthropic runs deep. Anthropic was founded from a splinter group of former OpenAI employees, including Amodei, who left due to differences in direction and focus on safety.
But it has recently reached new heights. This month, Anthropic put pressure on OpenAI with a new Super Bowl commercial series that was a thin dig at OpenAI’s decision to start pushing ads into ChatGPT.
And it clearly struck a nerve. Mr. Altman went on an irreverent, lengthy tirade against X, calling Anthropic’s advertising “deceptive” and suggesting that Anthropic was an “authoritarian company.” It was as if he was trying to convince us that he was okay with the joke and wasn’t having a mini-meltdown like he was clearly having, while admitting that he thought the ad was “funny.”
The two companies are also poised to spar over how to shape regulations for the industry. Last week, Anthropic announced it would pour $20 million into a super PAC created to compete with another super PAC backed by key figures and investors at OpenAI. While Anthropic is fighting for stronger AI regulations, OpenAI supports laissez-faire terms of competition. Among other things, the funds will be used to support the campaigns of favored candidates in the upcoming midterm elections.
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