Technology Analyses

Surface Story

China sought access to Anthropic's most advanced AI models. Anthropic said no. The decision was made internally, by company leadership, with no public process and no external oversight.

Underneath the Story

The question of which countries and populations get access to the most powerful AI systems is now being answered by private companies on the basis of their own strategic calculations. There is no democratic process governing these decisions, no international framework, and no accountability structure. A small number of companies in a small number of cities are deciding, unilaterally, which parts of the world get access to transformative technology and which do not. This is an extraordinary concentration of consequential power.

Surface Story

A new generation of AI-powered children's toys are hitting the market, responding to kids in real time and adapting to their voices, preferences, and emotional patterns. There is no federal regulation specifically governing what happens to that data.

Underneath the Story

The 'educational AI toy' category was designed to exist in a regulatory gap that companies are racing to exploit before it closes. Children cannot consent to data collection. Parents cannot audit what is collected or how it is used. The companies building these products know exactly what they are doing and are moving fast precisely because of it. The learning is not happening in the toy. It is happening in the model.

Surface Story

The White House is exploring a federal pre-release vetting process for AI models, requiring government review before public deployment. The proposal would establish standards for what counts as 'safe enough' AI before it reaches consumers and businesses.

Underneath the Story

A vetting regime controlled by the executive branch does not constrain AI power - it consolidates it, handing whoever sits in the White House the authority to greenlight or kill any AI system before the public ever touches it. The question of who sets the safety standard is inseparable from the question of who benefits from the answer, and the companies already embedded in Washington are positioned to write those standards in their own image. This proposal arrives precisely as American AI labs are racing to deploy frontier models, which means a federal gate does not slow the race - it just determines who controls the finish line.