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"OpenAI was plugging Claude into its own internal tools using special developer access (APIs)" Unless it's actually some internal Claude API which OpenAI were

"OpenAI was plugging Claude into its own internal tools using special developer access (APIs)" Unless it's actually some internal Claude API which OpenAI were using with an OpenAI benchmarking tool, this sounds like a hyped-up way for Wired to phrase it. Almost like: `Woah man, OpenAI HACKED Claude's own AI mainframe until Sonnet slammed down the firewall man!` ;D Seriously though, why phrase API use of Claude as "special developer access"? I suppose that it's reasonable to disagree on what is reasonable for safety benchmarking, e.g: where you draw a line and say, "hey, that's stealing" vs "they were able to find safety weak spots in their model". I wonder what the best labs are like at efficiently hunting for weak areas! Funnily enough I think Anthropic have banned a lot of people from their API, myself included - and all I did was see if it could read a letter I got, and they never responded to my query to sort it out! But what does it matter if people can just use OpenRouter?

dylan604 1y ago
> Seriously though, why phrase API use of Claude as "special developer access"? Isn't that precisely what an API is? Normal users do not use the API. Other programs written by developers use it to access Claude from their app. That's like asking why is an SDK phrased as a special kit for developers to build software that works with something they wish to integrate into their app
- viraptor 1y ago
  Because it's not "special developer access". It's just "normal developer access". The phrasing gives an impression they accessed something other users cannot.
  - CPLX 1y ago
    It would be normal standard English to assume that special modifies the word access. That would make the sentence semantically be the same as “special access, specifically the type of access used by developers” Compare with a sentence like “the elevator has special firefighter buttons” which does not mean that only some special type of firefighter uses the button.
    - toomanyrichies 1y ago
      Counter-point: as a wordsmith, it's incumbent on the article's author to make their point in an unambiguous way. In your example, rather than write "the elevator has special firefighter buttons", the author could choose to write "the elevator has buttons which are only available to firefighters". Or alternatively, "the elevator has buttons which are only available to certain firefighters". The amount of care the author puts into their phrasing determines whether their point comes across as intended, or not. The average magazine reader can likely figure out that there's no such thing as "special" firefighters with "privileged" access to elevator buttons that other firefighters lack. They may not have the programming knowledge to do likewise with "developer access", even if they are reading a magazine like "Wired".
      - Bluestein 1y ago
        It's Newswriting 101-level stuff.-
    - Calavar 1y ago
      In your example, "firefighter buttons" is a noun phrase which refers to a particular type of button. "Special" applies to the whole of "firefighter buttons," not just to "firefighter" and not just to "buttons." The same would apply for "special developer access."
      - nilamo 1y ago
        So it isn't normal developer access, like an API, there's something special about it that most developers with access to the API could not access.
    - tick_tock_tick 1y ago
      > the elevator has special firefighter buttons If you said that to anyone they'd assume there are non standard buttons beyond the normal "call" / "fire" buttons. Special changes the meaning in both sentences.
      - 1y ago
- stavros 1y ago
  If I'm an OpenAI employee, and I use Claude Code via the API, I'm not doing some hacker-fu, I'm just using a tool a company released for the purpose they released it. I understand that they were technically "using it to train models", which, given OpenAI's stance, I don't have much sympathy for, but it's not some "special developer hackery" that this is making it sound like.
- dgfitz 1y ago
  Normal users use the API constantly, they just don’t realize it. Isn’t half the schtick of LLMs making software development available for the layman?
- slacktivism123 1y ago
  >That's like asking why is an SDK phrased as a special kit It's Software Developer Kit, not Special Developer Kit ;-)
- 708145_ 1y ago
  Most people reading Wired probably don't know what an API is.
poemxo 1y ago
I agree, it does sound like they're hyping it up. But maybe the author was confused. In the API ecosystem, there are special APIs that some customers get access to that the normal riff-raff do not. If someone called those "special developer access" I don't think it'd be wrong
- luke-stanley 1y ago
  Yeah that's possible! Would love more details if true.
subscribed 1y ago
Yeah, Anthropic are morons. They banned my account completely for violation of ToS and never responded to my query, following my 3 or 4 chats with Claude where i asked for music and sci-fi books recommendations. Never violated ToS, account created through they ui, used literally few times. Well, I don't use them at all except for very rare tests through open router indeed.
- arcfour 1y ago
  I'm not sure this is a useful data point or how it makes them morons?
  - Twirrim 1y ago
    Agreed, not sure it makes them morons. The way their website scraper works is what makes me think they're morons. I opted to honeypot them in iocaine, because their access rate is absurd. On a typical day on my small website, they'll make nearly 550k calls, so averaging just above 6rps. Almost everyone else I honeypotted barely pushes 1 rps. Almost everything I see from Anthropic gives me the impression they're self-entitled jerks.
  - luke-stanley 1y ago
    Anthropic are wicked smart, it's not fair to call them morons, BUT the ToS ban of subscribed, myself, and OpenAI might be useful data points suggesting Anthropic's API moderation behaviour can be strict. Anthropic are doing great work overall, but they have erred on the side of policy robustness, versus keeping API users happy. I said more in my sibling comment reply.
- luke-stanley 1y ago
  Well I don't think Anthropic are morons, that's not the point I was making. Yes, I'm frustrated with Anthropic killing my direct API account for silly reasons, with no response. But actually I really appreciate Anthropic's models for code, their deep safety research with Constitutional AI, interpretability studies etc. They are certainly guilty of having scaling and customer service issues, and making the wrong call with a faulty moderation system (for you too, and many others it seems like)! But a lot of serious AI safety research that could literally save all our skin is being done by Anthropic, some of the best. On OpenAI's API Platform, I am on Tier 5! It's unfortunate Anthropic have acted less commercially savvy than OpenAI (at the time, at least). I have complained on HN and I think on Twitter before about my account to no avail, after emailing before. But yeah, usually I just use them via OpenRouter these days, it's a shame that I must use it for API access. I get the impression that a lot of OpenAI researchers went to Anthropic, which essentially is the first OpenAI splinter group. I think this is a sign of a serious, more healthy intellectual culture. I'm looking forward to seeing what they do next.

dylan604 1y ago

> Seriously though, why phrase API use of Claude as "special developer access"? Isn't that precisely what an API is? Normal users do not use the API. Other programs written by developers use it to access Claude from their app. That's like asking why is an SDK phrased as a special kit for developers to build software that works with something they wish to integrate into their app

viraptor 1y ago
Because it's not "special developer access". It's just "normal developer access". The phrasing gives an impression they accessed something other users cannot.
- CPLX 1y ago
  It would be normal standard English to assume that special modifies the word access. That would make the sentence semantically be the same as “special access, specifically the type of access used by developers” Compare with a sentence like “the elevator has special firefighter buttons” which does not mean that only some special type of firefighter uses the button.
  - toomanyrichies 1y ago
    Counter-point: as a wordsmith, it's incumbent on the article's author to make their point in an unambiguous way. In your example, rather than write "the elevator has special firefighter buttons", the author could choose to write "the elevator has buttons which are only available to firefighters". Or alternatively, "the elevator has buttons which are only available to certain firefighters". The amount of care the author puts into their phrasing determines whether their point comes across as intended, or not. The average magazine reader can likely figure out that there's no such thing as "special" firefighters with "privileged" access to elevator buttons that other firefighters lack. They may not have the programming knowledge to do likewise with "developer access", even if they are reading a magazine like "Wired".
    - Bluestein 1y ago
      It's Newswriting 101-level stuff.-
  - Calavar 1y ago
    In your example, "firefighter buttons" is a noun phrase which refers to a particular type of button. "Special" applies to the whole of "firefighter buttons," not just to "firefighter" and not just to "buttons." The same would apply for "special developer access."
    - nilamo 1y ago
      So it isn't normal developer access, like an API, there's something special about it that most developers with access to the API could not access.
  - tick_tock_tick 1y ago
    > the elevator has special firefighter buttons If you said that to anyone they'd assume there are non standard buttons beyond the normal "call" / "fire" buttons. Special changes the meaning in both sentences.
    - 1y ago
stavros 1y ago
If I'm an OpenAI employee, and I use Claude Code via the API, I'm not doing some hacker-fu, I'm just using a tool a company released for the purpose they released it. I understand that they were technically "using it to train models", which, given OpenAI's stance, I don't have much sympathy for, but it's not some "special developer hackery" that this is making it sound like.
dgfitz 1y ago
Normal users use the API constantly, they just don’t realize it. Isn’t half the schtick of LLMs making software development available for the layman?
slacktivism123 1y ago
>That's like asking why is an SDK phrased as a special kit It's Software Developer Kit, not Special Developer Kit ;-)
708145_ 1y ago
Most people reading Wired probably don't know what an API is.

poemxo 1y ago

I agree, it does sound like they're hyping it up. But maybe the author was confused. In the API ecosystem, there are special APIs that some customers get access to that the normal riff-raff do not. If someone called those "special developer access" I don't think it'd be wrong

luke-stanley 1y ago
Yeah that's possible! Would love more details if true.

subscribed 1y ago

Yeah, Anthropic are morons. They banned my account completely for violation of ToS and never responded to my query, following my 3 or 4 chats with Claude where i asked for music and sci-fi books recommendations. Never violated ToS, account created through they ui, used literally few times. Well, I don't use them at all except for very rare tests through open router indeed.

arcfour 1y ago
I'm not sure this is a useful data point or how it makes them morons?
- Twirrim 1y ago
  Agreed, not sure it makes them morons. The way their website scraper works is what makes me think they're morons. I opted to honeypot them in iocaine, because their access rate is absurd. On a typical day on my small website, they'll make nearly 550k calls, so averaging just above 6rps. Almost everyone else I honeypotted barely pushes 1 rps. Almost everything I see from Anthropic gives me the impression they're self-entitled jerks.
- luke-stanley 1y ago
  Anthropic are wicked smart, it's not fair to call them morons, BUT the ToS ban of subscribed, myself, and OpenAI might be useful data points suggesting Anthropic's API moderation behaviour can be strict. Anthropic are doing great work overall, but they have erred on the side of policy robustness, versus keeping API users happy. I said more in my sibling comment reply.
luke-stanley 1y ago
Well I don't think Anthropic are morons, that's not the point I was making. Yes, I'm frustrated with Anthropic killing my direct API account for silly reasons, with no response. But actually I really appreciate Anthropic's models for code, their deep safety research with Constitutional AI, interpretability studies etc. They are certainly guilty of having scaling and customer service issues, and making the wrong call with a faulty moderation system (for you too, and many others it seems like)! But a lot of serious AI safety research that could literally save all our skin is being done by Anthropic, some of the best. On OpenAI's API Platform, I am on Tier 5! It's unfortunate Anthropic have acted less commercially savvy than OpenAI (at the time, at least). I have complained on HN and I think on Twitter before about my account to no avail, after emailing before. But yeah, usually I just use them via OpenRouter these days, it's a shame that I must use it for API access. I get the impression that a lot of OpenAI researchers went to Anthropic, which essentially is the first OpenAI splinter group. I think this is a sign of a serious, more healthy intellectual culture. I'm looking forward to seeing what they do next.