'So clearly dishonest': Sam Altman responds to Anthropic's Super Bowl ad targeting ChatGPT — here's what he said

News
By published

It made him laugh, but Sam Altman isn't happy

Sam Altman at a press conference
(Image credit: Getty Images)

It wasn't just the Seahawks and the Patriots clashing at this year's Super Bowl. Anthropic, the company behind Claude, dropped some not-so-subtle digs at its chief rival, OpenAI, in commercials that criticised the latter's decision to start introducing ads.

Anthropic had several commercials that played during the game, including one where a young guy asks a jacked personal trainer to help him get a six pack quickly.

Can I get a six pack quickly? - YouTube Can I get a six pack quickly? - YouTube
Watch On

It's a pretty slick ad and, at no point, does it directly reference ChatGPT, which confirmed back on January 16 that it would soon be introducing ads. However, that didn't stop Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, from responding with a 420-word long post on X last week when the ads were first teased.

While Altman claimed the ads "are funny" and that he "laughed", he also said they were "so clearly dishonest."

"Our most important principle for ads says that we won’t do exactly this; we would obviously never run ads in the way Anthropic depicts them. We are not stupid and we know our users would reject that."

Altman returns fire at Anthropic, accusing it of "doublespeak" and saying the company wants to "control what people do with AI."

He then goes on to talk about Codex, ChatGPT's new coding agent. Unfortunately, he also doesn't give us any further concrete details about the rollout of ads on ChatGPT and what to expect.

How will ChatGPT display ads?

OpenAI has previously confirmed that the Plus, Pro and Enterprise subscriptions will not get ads, and also that ChatGPT's responses "will not be influenced by ads" and that subscribers' conversations will remain private and won’t be used to target advertising.

The commercials themselves will be separate and clearly labeled. In an example that OpenAI described as one of the formats it plans to test, the advertisement shows up at the bottom of your chat with a linkout.

ChatGPT ad example

(Image credit: OpenAI)

Meanwhile, the company says that chats which cover sensitive topics like health, mental health or politics also won't receive ads. Currently, only users aged over 18 will be part of the testing procedure and OpenAI says it will seek feedback to ensure ads "support broad access to AI."

Sam Altman's full response to Anthropic's 'dishonest' commercials

If you want to know everything that Sam Altman said in response to Anthropic's Super Bowl adverts, here's his full statement:

First, the good part of the Anthropic ads: they are funny, and I laughed.

But I wonder why Anthropic would go for something so clearly dishonest. Our most important principle for ads says that we won’t do exactly this; we would obviously never run ads in the way Anthropic depicts them. We are not stupid and we know our users would reject that.

I guess it’s on brand for Anthropic doublespeak to use a deceptive ad to critique theoretical deceptive ads that aren’t real, but a Super Bowl ad is not where I would expect it.

More importantly, we believe everyone deserves to use AI and are committed to free access, because we believe access creates agency. More Texans use ChatGPT for free than total people use Claude in the US, so we have a differently-shaped problem than they do. (If you want to pay for ChatGPT Plus or Pro, we don't show you ads.)

Anthropic serves an expensive product to rich people. We are glad they do that and we are doing that too, but we also feel strongly that we need to bring AI to billions of people who can’t pay for subscriptions.

Maybe even more importantly: Anthropic wants to control what people do with AI—they block companies they don't like from using their coding product (including us), they want to write the rules themselves for what people can and can't use AI for, and now they also want to tell other companies what their business models can be.

We are committed to broad, democratic decision making in addition to access. We are also committed to building the most resilient ecosystem for advanced AI. We care a great deal about safe, broadly beneficial AGI, and we know the only way to get there is to work with the world to prepare.

One authoritarian company won't get us there on their own, to say nothing of the other obvious risks. It is a dark path.

As for our Super Bowl ad: it’s about builders, and how anyone can now build anything.

We are enjoying watching so many people switch to Codex. There have now been 500,000 app downloads since launch on Monday, and we think builders are really going to love what’s coming in the next few weeks. I believe Codex is going to win.

We will continue to work hard to make even more intelligence available for lower and lower prices to our users.

This time belongs to the builders, not the people who want to control them.

Google News

Follow Tom's Guide on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our up-to-date news, analysis, and reviews in your feeds.

More from Tom's Guide

Jeff Parsons
Jeff Parsons
UK Editor In Chief

Jeff is UK Editor-in-Chief for Tom’s Guide looking after the day-to-day output of the site’s British contingent.

A tech journalist for over a decade, he’s travelled the world testing any gadget he can get his hands on. Jeff has a keen interest in fitness and wearables as well as the latest tablets and laptops.

A lapsed gamer, he fondly remembers the days when technical problems were solved by taking out the cartridge and blowing out the dust.

You must confirm your public display name before commenting

Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.