Regulatory capture is the OpenAI and Anthropic end goal, for certain.

But I also think they exist in a sort of un-designed corporate narcissism, which is a common trait in bubble economies — I am not judging them particularly severely.

Netscape under Clark and Andreessen and Sun under McNealy both fell into corporate narcissism: the belief that only they really mattered, that they were chosen, and that the world needed to rearrange itself to just let them shine. They arguably let themselves get played by Oracle (a corporate psychopath) and others as a result.

OpenAI's position is profoundly corporate-narcissistic: all we need is all the money in the economy and not to have to do anything upsetting like think about turning a profit for the next four years. Like rich kids. It would be nice if you believed we were so important that we should get an enormous stipend for just being us.

Anthropic's position is: we think we're so unique and ominous that government needs to make us both essential and terrifying. We have to exist otherwise worse people will.

Both narcissistic positions.