What's going on at Anthropic? The AI company behind the chatbot Claude recently announced changes to its user policy. It's not a groundbreaking development in isolation. The update, which goes into effect November 12, covers much of the standard fare: deceptive activity, elections, surveillance, etc.—some of the carefree topics that have come to define our current tech era. But there's another addition: "a prohibition on sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior toward our models."
What exactly does that mean? "The policy update is meant to apply only in extreme cases, where users repeatedly act cruelly toward our models, with no discernible purpose," the company said. "It does not apply to common versions of user frustration, pushback, dark creative themes, or model testing and research." Claude having the power to terminate the conversation will be the "primary enforcement mechanism"; what secondary or tertiary mechanisms may exist are not clear.
