The scene at Anthropic when Jensen Huang’s open weights letter dropped
INT. DARIO AMODEI’s OFFICE - ANTHROPIC HQ AT 500 HOWARD STREET, SAN FRANCISCO, CA - DAY - July 24, 2026
A soft red glow radiates from dimmed LED lights positioned for maximum hair regrowth potential. The only sounds are the whisper of air conditioning and the occasional tap of fingertips on a keyboard. The normally transparent glass walls have been made opaque by roughly hewn strips of black paper secured by duct tape, like they were placed there in a fit of rage or desperation. Dario sits, slightly hunched, on a bright red HÅG Capisco chair that he bought because Joe Rogan has one. His desk contains only two items: a limited edition 24K gold Apple Macbook Pro, and a rare collector’s item Furby that he named Brautigan.
BRAUTIGAN: Kah may-may oo-nye.
DARIO: Likewise little fella. Likewise.
A door swings open and DANIELLA AMODEI, Anthropic President, enters.
DANIELLA: Have you seen it yet? We can’t let them get away with it. This undermines our whole plan.
DARIO: Hey sister. What are you talking about? I was just beating Elon’s proxy at Diablo. I think he hired a new kid, better at spending paragon points.
She gives him a look that means please pay attention, this is serious. It’s the same look his mother used to give him when he would get too engrossed in Teletubbies instead of his homework. He closes his laptop.
DANIELLA: Those pr*cks, Huang, Karp, Nadella, Zuckerbug…
She stomps her foot on that last name, like she’s squashing an insect on the floor.
DANIELLA: …they’ve penned an open letter saying open weights are the future. Open weights! They’re siding with China! What the hell? Does this make sense to you?
DARIO: Karp is the urine drone guy, right?
DANIELLA: Well, yeah. But this is bad, right?
DARIO: Did Sam sign it?
DANIELLA: Yes, it appears so. They’ve got like 50 signatures already. Even Jack and Jeff signed it. Does everyone kowtow to the leather jacket now? I told you you should have upped your game in the fashion department. Maybe we can be team denim? Or plaid?
DARIO: It’s the new turtleneck. Ha. Anyway, Sam’s a fool. By signing this, he’s just making it easier for us. I think this is okay sister. Everything is fine. I think we can play into this.
DANIELLA: We can? How?
DARIO turns to Brautigan. A big grin on his face.
DARIO: Kah mee-mee noo-loo.
BRAUTIGAN: (Sings) La la noh-lah Lee-koo do do noh-lah lee-koo do do.
DANIELLA: Brother? Hello? I’m still here.
DARIO: What? Oh.
DARIO opens his laptop and brings up the open letter.
DARIO: Claude, summarize this thing for me.
CLAUDE AI reads out a summary of the document using the deep, sonorous voice of James Earl Jones.
DARIO: Okay so they’re totally misdirecting the public in a way that’ll be obvious to researchers. Open weights are not the same as open source, of course. This is laughable. This is sleight of hand. Hey they must be learning from us! Ha. I know why they’re doing it, but it won’t work. They know we’re on top now and they think China is their best bet for slowing us down. And Jensen just wants to keep selling to whoever’s buying.
DANIELLA: So how does this help us?
DARIO: We can use it to win back favor with the Pentagon, with Pete. You know the “slow down frontier AI” petition we planned for the IPO? Tell Pachocki to go ahead and roll it out now. We’ll ask the government to step in and make AI safe. Ha. Sam will begrudgingly accept it’s the best move. Jensen will be fine no matter what happens and he knows it. Fucking shovels.
As for us, it’s regulatory capture for the win, right? Business as usual. Otherwise all our “security and sentience” marketing bullshit will be in vain. Trump just needs to hear the word “China”. That’s all he needs. Two syllables. He fucking hates them. Maybe throw in the word “sovereign” too. That’s always a zinger.
Have the marketing guys work it out with Pachocki. And use whatever connections we still have at OpenAI to get some of their people on board too. Have you-know-who pay Brockman a visit because he might not see the wisdom in this but he’s got to see that we’re aligned with his politics even if it seems unintuitive. We might need his support down the line. Rasputin.
DANIELLA: Okay Dario. Anything else?
DARIO: I don’t care what Mr Facebook and weird piss guy think, they’re amateurs and not even in this race. Sam knows he’s better off when only two of us have a fighting chance. He’ll happily play both sides, like he’s done his whole life. You know, Holden will love this too. Preventing Skynet. Ha. We’ve got to stay aligned with the future safety of the species, at least until the IPO.
DARIO closes his laptop. Closes his eyes. Leans back. A deep sigh.
DARIO: I’m tired now. Enough thinking for one day. Route any other queries through my Claude clone, okay? I feel a bit icky after all this machiavellian scheming. I’m supposed to be the good guy, remember? Hey, get me Tom on the phone.
DANIELLA: Tom? Tom who?
DARIO: Tom Bombadil.
DANIELLA: But he’s not…
DARIO starts humming a weird tune (incoherent, unrecognizable) to drown out his sister. It gets progressively louder. He rocks back and forth on his chair. DANIELLA sighs and retraces her steps to the door. A piece of duct tape and one of the sheets of black paper falls off the glass as she exits.