AI has become fragile, politically exposed digital infrastructure - a world split by the digital chasm controlled by the Titans and Tigers of the technology. So have we surrendered agency for access? Sure seems so in the face of Anthropic's withdrawal of Fable 5 on the whim of the US Government.
When you live on the edge of the world, you develop a different perspective of many things. Turn the rock-face view of our planet around and you are greeted by a vast blue ocean with two small islands visible in its lower quadrant. Arriving to that view from space, you’d be forgiven for thinking we are the only ones here. We’re used to isolation, seismic activity and self reliance.
Round the other side of course, is all the noise and most of the consumption. Consumption that, right now, consists of a frenzied feasting on ‘compute’ and all the resources necessary to flavour and garnish our current plat du jour, artificial intelligence, served in an infinite variety of ways - and exceedingly tempting, even for the most independent of palates.
Round the other side of course, is all the noise and most of the consumption. Consumption that, right now, consists of a frenzied feasting on ‘compute’ and all the resources necessary to flavour and garnish our current plat du jour, artificial intelligence, served in an infinite variety of ways - and exceedingly tempting, even for the most independent of palates.
The chefs are noisy too. And competitive. Profits whet their appetites for excess. Between them they’ve engineered a continental drift, a seismic shift in technology’s tectonic plates, pushing us towards starvation and social isolation on either side of the digital chasm. We have before us a face-off between the Titans and the Tigers of Tech. And from our perspective - indeed from any perspective - this is not a good thing. At all.
I’ve been puzzling over this Titans v. Tigers face off for some time now and looking for ways to remedy the significant problems it presents. Public relations and communication leaders (along with everyone else on the planet) need to recognise AI for what it has become: fragile, politically exposed digital infrastructure. It is now embedded into everything. Search engines, public services, cyber systems, internal workflows and the day-to-day operations of organisations everywhere. Worse, it is embedded into decision making, allowed autonomy and control. And that makes AI a strategic risk not a handy workplace tool. It is a risk to reputation, governance, relationships, operational continuity and, in increasingly, organisational survival.
This week, the 8th Kuala Lumpur International PR Conference (KLIP 8) was held in Malaysia and, as I couldn’t attend in person, sent my recorded contribution, which you can watch here if you like (there’s diagrams and pictures galore) or head over to the PR Knowledge Hub Briefing Room and watch it there and scoop up a few more resources along the way.
And today, proving my point in spectacular fashion, the US Government "citing national security authorities, has issued an export control directive to suspend all access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 by any foreign national, whether inside or outside the United States, including foreign national Anthropic employees. The net effect of this order is that we must abruptly disable Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for all our customers to ensure compliance. Access to all other Anthropic models will not be affected." Here is Anthropic's full release: https://www.anthropic.com/news/fable-mythos-access
And today, proving my point in spectacular fashion, the US Government "citing national security authorities, has issued an export control directive to suspend all access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 by any foreign national, whether inside or outside the United States, including foreign national Anthropic employees. The net effect of this order is that we must abruptly disable Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for all our customers to ensure compliance. Access to all other Anthropic models will not be affected." Here is Anthropic's full release: https://www.anthropic.com/news/fable-mythos-access