There was a time I would have agreed with you, but these days even as an American I fail to see a difference. China is probably less likely to try to disenfranchise or imprison me, to be honest.
I don't get it, the person you're replying to didn't mention the US at all – there was no distinction being drawn, and they weren't asserting that American models are better or more resistant to government censorship. It's possible to agree with them about Chinese models without expatiating on why American models are bad too.
From that lens, criticism of one is practically implicit support of the other. If I tell you that you can buy from salesman A or B, but B is a bad person, that implies A is not a bad person. Otherwise I would have said “they’re both bad people”.
“But Chinese models are controlled by the government” makes it sound an awful lot like the US ones aren’t, because it wouldn’t be a meaningful criticism if that were true of both.
China is different. The CCP will rule forever, no matter how terrible the things they do. No one is allowed to criticize the government. Xi is like Voldemort—no one can say his name, let alone criticize him.
China does worse on those fronts, but they do so predictably. I don’t agree with many of their goals, but you can generally rely on them pursuing those goals in a manner consistent with their values. Ie I’m not often taken aback by how they respond, it’s within the realm of things I’d expect.
The US is concerning because their behavior is wildly unpredictable, which makes them unreliable even if their values align better with mine (purportedly, anyways). I have no idea when or if Fable will be back, or what kind of modifications the government will demand, or if this will apply to other models, and whether any of that is going to impact Anthropics or OpenAIs ability to release models.
I was already wary of Claude Code and Codex because I don’t like being tied to a provider-specific tool (I don’t trust they won’t cut off swapping the API URL), and now that’s even worse because I’m not even sure either will stay at the front of the pack. I’m sure as hell not using a vendor locked tool tied to the 5th best model provider (if they fall).
If China, or Chinese companies, end up with a monopoly-like advantage in AI, the result will be like the current rare-earth situation. China will absolutely put strict controls on AI models, and that would be much worse than depending on OpenAI or Claude.
True of any US frontier lab as well
> Backing any large Chinese company effectively means backing the Chinese government and its oppression in Xinjiang, Tibet, Hong Kong—and maybe soon Taiwan, Southeast Asia, and elsewhere around the world.
So when I pay anthropic am I also sponsoring the mass murder of school children in Iran?
Also, in today's environment with the US using AI in active wars while blocking whole models from even its own citizens, the words you say against the Chinese government is particularly weak.
Like, DUH, people. What are we doing here?