In all such discussions, it is interesting to track the tipping point at which public perception of Anthropic shifted.

In my mind, as recently as February, Anthropic was considered by far “the best” company on the planet, with an insane fanbase and praise left, right, and centre. The story around the DoD contract solidified them in the public eye as “the hero the city deserved.”

Then they fell into a classic monetisation trap. Unable to sustain growth at such a discount, they started nerfing models, removing caching, and doubling costs per token to make any money here.

The lack of transparency in that process cost them public perception. By early May, all the charm of the magical, ethical super-company was gone. The entire campaign around the Mythos release, intentional or not, landed on top of that new narrative and didn’t play well for them.

What is interesting to me here is the realisation that a good chunk of the hate the company received came simply because of their most recent hostile, for-profit actions. Had it happened in March, HN and the public reaction would have been vastly different. It took them just two months of “bad actions” to ruin quite a good margin of the public praise they so desperately needed now.