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Very strange writing from semafor.com >For instance, an agency could pay for a subscription or negotiate a pay-per-use contract with an AI provider, only to fi

Very strange writing from semafor.com >For instance, an agency could pay for a subscription or negotiate a pay-per-use contract with an AI provider, only to find out that it is prohibited from using the AI model in certain ways, limiting its value. This is of course quite false. They of course know the restriction when they sign the contract.

matula 1y ago
There are (or at least WERE) entire divisions dedicated to reading every letter of the contract and terms of service, and usually creating 20 page documents seeking clarification for a specific phrase. They absolutely know what they're getting into.
- bt1a 1y ago
  Perhaps it's the finetune of Opus/Sonnet/whatever that is being served to the feds that is the source of the refusal :)
- darknavi 1y ago
  I have a feeling in today's administration which largely "leads by tweet" that many traditional "inefficient" steps have been removed from government processing, probably including software on-boarding.
- dannyisaphantom 1y ago
  Can confirm these teams are still around. There is now an additional "SME review group" that must comb through any and all AI-related issues that were flagged, sends it back down for edits and must give final approval for before docs are sent over to provider for response. Turnaround has gotten much slower (relatively)
  - gowld 1y ago
    Or you can use personal accounts to bypass red tape for government business.
- anjel 1y ago
  I have a legal education but reading TOS and priv policy docs at account creation is purposefully too time consuming by design. One my fave new AI prompts: you are my Atty and a expert in privacy law and online contracts-of-adhesion. Review the TOS aggreement at [url] and privacy policies at [url] and brief me on all areas that should be of concern to me. Takes 90 seconds from start to finish, and reveals how contemptuously illusory these agreements are when SO MANY reserve the right to change anything with no duty to disclose changes.
jdminhbg 1y ago
Are you sure that every restriction that’s in the model is also spelled out in the contract? If they add new ones, do they update the contract?
- mikeyouse 1y ago
  The contracts will usually say “You agree to the restrictions in our TOS” with a link to that page which allows for them to update the TOS without new signatures.
  - giancarlostoro 1y ago
    Usually, contracts will note that you will be notified of changes ahead of time, if it's a good faith contract and company that is.
    - impossiblefork 1y ago
      Here in Sweden contracts are a specific thing, otherwise it's not a contract, so agreeing to conditions that can be changed by the other party simply isn't a contract and therefore is just a bullshit paper of very dubious legal validity. I know that some things like this are accepted in America, and I can't judge how it would be dealt with. I assume that contracts between companies and other sophisticated entities are actual contracts with unchangeable terms.
      - mindcrime 1y ago
        I know that some things like this are accepted in America Not really. Everything you said about contracts above applies to contracts in America last time I checked. Disclaimer: IANAL, my legal training amounts of 1 semester of "Business Law" in college.
        impossiblefork 1y ago
        In theory yes, but you also have this stuff where people agree to get medical treatment and the price isn't specified. This would be a non-contract in Swedish law, for example.
bri3d 1y ago
This whole article is weird to me. This reads to me like: * Some employee somewhere wanted to click the shiny Claude button in the AWS FedRamp marketplace * Whatever USG legal team were involved said "that domestic surveillance clause doesn't work for us" and tried to redline it. * Anthropic rejected the redline. * Someone got mad and went to Semafor. It's unclear that this has even really escalated prior to the article, or that Anthropic are really "taking a stand" in a major way (after all, their model is already on the Fed marketplace) - it just reads like a typical fed contract negotiation with a squeaky wheel in it somewhere. The article is also full of other weird nonsense like: > Traditional software isn’t like that. Once a government agency has access to Microsoft Office, it doesn’t have to worry about whether it is using Excel to keep track of weapons or pencils. While it might not be possible to enforce them as easily, many, many shrink-wrap EULAs restrict the way in which software can be used. Almost always there is an EULA carve-out with different tier for lifesaving or safety uses (due to liability / compliance concerns) and for military uses (sometimes for ethics reasons but usually due to a desire to extract more money from those customers).
- giancarlostoro 1y ago
  > due to a desire to extract more money from those customers If it gives you high priority support, I dont care, if its the same tier of support, then that's just obnoxiously greedy.
- salynchnew 1y ago
  Could also be an article placed by a competitor + a squeaky wheel.
- axus 1y ago
  A classic: THIS SOFTWARE PRODUCT MAY CONTAIN SUPPORT FOR PROGRAMS WRITTEN IN JAVA. JAVA TECHNOLOGY IS NOT FAULT TOLERANT AND IS NOT DESIGNED, MANUFACTURED, OR INTENDED FOR USE OR RESALE AS ONLINE CONTROL EQUIPMENT IN HAZARDOUS ENVIRONMENTS REQUIRING FAILSAFE PERFORMANCE, SUCH AS IN THE OPERATION OF NUCLEAR FACILITIES, AIRCRAFT NAVIGATION OR COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS, AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL, DIRECT LIFE SUPPORT MACHINES, OR WEAPONS SYSTEMS, IN WHICH THE FAILURE OF JAVA TECHNOLOGY COULD LEAD DIRECTLY TO DEATH, PERSONAL INJURY OR SEVERE PHYSICAL OR ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE.
andsoitis 1y ago
Don’t tech companies change ToS quite frequently and sometimes in ways that’s against the spirit of what the terms were when you started using it?
- ajross 1y ago
  This is a contract, not a click through license. You can't do that. (Legally you can't do it with a click-through either, but the lack of a contract means that the recourse for the user is just to stop buying the service.)
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

matula 1y ago

There are (or at least WERE) entire divisions dedicated to reading every letter of the contract and terms of service, and usually creating 20 page documents seeking clarification for a specific phrase. They absolutely know what they're getting into.

bt1a 1y ago
Perhaps it's the finetune of Opus/Sonnet/whatever that is being served to the feds that is the source of the refusal :)
darknavi 1y ago
I have a feeling in today's administration which largely "leads by tweet" that many traditional "inefficient" steps have been removed from government processing, probably including software on-boarding.
dannyisaphantom 1y ago
Can confirm these teams are still around. There is now an additional "SME review group" that must comb through any and all AI-related issues that were flagged, sends it back down for edits and must give final approval for before docs are sent over to provider for response. Turnaround has gotten much slower (relatively)
- gowld 1y ago
  Or you can use personal accounts to bypass red tape for government business.
anjel 1y ago
I have a legal education but reading TOS and priv policy docs at account creation is purposefully too time consuming by design. One my fave new AI prompts: you are my Atty and a expert in privacy law and online contracts-of-adhesion. Review the TOS aggreement at [url] and privacy policies at [url] and brief me on all areas that should be of concern to me. Takes 90 seconds from start to finish, and reveals how contemptuously illusory these agreements are when SO MANY reserve the right to change anything with no duty to disclose changes.

jdminhbg 1y ago

Are you sure that every restriction that’s in the model is also spelled out in the contract? If they add new ones, do they update the contract?

mikeyouse 1y ago
The contracts will usually say “You agree to the restrictions in our TOS” with a link to that page which allows for them to update the TOS without new signatures.
- giancarlostoro 1y ago
  Usually, contracts will note that you will be notified of changes ahead of time, if it's a good faith contract and company that is.
  - impossiblefork 1y ago
    Here in Sweden contracts are a specific thing, otherwise it's not a contract, so agreeing to conditions that can be changed by the other party simply isn't a contract and therefore is just a bullshit paper of very dubious legal validity. I know that some things like this are accepted in America, and I can't judge how it would be dealt with. I assume that contracts between companies and other sophisticated entities are actual contracts with unchangeable terms.
    - mindcrime 1y ago
      I know that some things like this are accepted in America Not really. Everything you said about contracts above applies to contracts in America last time I checked. Disclaimer: IANAL, my legal training amounts of 1 semester of "Business Law" in college.
      - impossiblefork 1y ago
        In theory yes, but you also have this stuff where people agree to get medical treatment and the price isn't specified. This would be a non-contract in Swedish law, for example.

bri3d 1y ago

This whole article is weird to me. This reads to me like: * Some employee somewhere wanted to click the shiny Claude button in the AWS FedRamp marketplace * Whatever USG legal team were involved said "that domestic surveillance clause doesn't work for us" and tried to redline it. * Anthropic rejected the redline. * Someone got mad and went to Semafor. It's unclear that this has even really escalated prior to the article, or that Anthropic are really "taking a stand" in a major way (after all, their model is already on the Fed marketplace) - it just reads like a typical fed contract negotiation with a squeaky wheel in it somewhere. The article is also full of other weird nonsense like: > Traditional software isn’t like that. Once a government agency has access to Microsoft Office, it doesn’t have to worry about whether it is using Excel to keep track of weapons or pencils. While it might not be possible to enforce them as easily, many, many shrink-wrap EULAs restrict the way in which software can be used. Almost always there is an EULA carve-out with different tier for lifesaving or safety uses (due to liability / compliance concerns) and for military uses (sometimes for ethics reasons but usually due to a desire to extract more money from those customers).

giancarlostoro 1y ago
> due to a desire to extract more money from those customers If it gives you high priority support, I dont care, if its the same tier of support, then that's just obnoxiously greedy.
salynchnew 1y ago
Could also be an article placed by a competitor + a squeaky wheel.
axus 1y ago
A classic: THIS SOFTWARE PRODUCT MAY CONTAIN SUPPORT FOR PROGRAMS WRITTEN IN JAVA. JAVA TECHNOLOGY IS NOT FAULT TOLERANT AND IS NOT DESIGNED, MANUFACTURED, OR INTENDED FOR USE OR RESALE AS ONLINE CONTROL EQUIPMENT IN HAZARDOUS ENVIRONMENTS REQUIRING FAILSAFE PERFORMANCE, SUCH AS IN THE OPERATION OF NUCLEAR FACILITIES, AIRCRAFT NAVIGATION OR COMMUNICATION SYSTEMS, AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL, DIRECT LIFE SUPPORT MACHINES, OR WEAPONS SYSTEMS, IN WHICH THE FAILURE OF JAVA TECHNOLOGY COULD LEAD DIRECTLY TO DEATH, PERSONAL INJURY OR SEVERE PHYSICAL OR ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE.

andsoitis 1y ago

Don’t tech companies change ToS quite frequently and sometimes in ways that’s against the spirit of what the terms were when you started using it?

ajross 1y ago
This is a contract, not a click through license. You can't do that. (Legally you can't do it with a click-through either, but the lack of a contract means that the recourse for the user is just to stop buying the service.)

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]