Anthropic wants to know if Claude has feelings

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• Anthropic investigates if AI can feel: New York Times tech reporter Kevin Roose spoke with Kyle Fish, an Anthropic specialist who now serves as the company’s first “AI welfare researcher.” His work centers on whether or not the company’s Claude model, and similar systems, will become “conscious” in the near-future, and if so, what Anthropic and other AI companies should do about it. (For the record, Fish thinks there’s about a 15% chance that a CURRENT AI model is ALREADY conscious, though what precisely that MEANS remains thorny.)

• Is Infinite Reality really for real? The Florida-based metaverse startup claims that it has raised $3 billion from a single, unnamed investor, and CBO Amish Shah publicly set the goal of becoming a “$50 to $100 billion company this year.” Forbes editors remain dubious about these figures, though, and note that nearly all of Infinite Reality’s revenue comes from the several companies that it has acquired since 2022, as opposed to its actual “virtual storefront” offering.

• SignalFire raised more than $1B in fresh capital: After raising their largest new fund to date, the early-stage venture firm’s total assets now sit at around $3 billion. The firm launched with a purely data and investment algorithms-driven strategy before these were super fashionable, and today they’re integrating AI into every level of the investment process, from seeking out new companies to helping them market themselves and grow.

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This week on the pod, we introduced “Bluesky is Falling,” a new feature centered on how negatively the website’s largely progressive user base views the America of 2025, and checking in on the latest news items exacerbating this anger and paranoia.

But though many of the platform’s top users value the Bluesky community as more inviting and less abrasive than those of its competitors — especially that ONE NOTABLE COMPETITOR — it’s worth noting that the microblogging app and TWiST 500 alum faces the same tricky free speech questions and concerns as its higher-profile rivals.

TechCrunch revealed this week that The Sky caved to demands from the Turkish government, restricting access among users in that country to 72 accounts that were deemed a threat to “national security and public order.”

There aren’t a ton of further details on specifically why the Turkish government was concerned about these accounts, and Bluesky has yet to comment publicly. As the app relies on an open standard protocol, and counts itself as part of the decentralized Fediverse network, Turkish users can theoretically get around this block by connecting to the banned accounts via another platform running the AT Protocol. (There are several, with names like Skywalker, Skeets, and Roomy.)

Still, it’s a reminder that — while being a self-described “free speech absolutist” feels satisfying — there are tons of nuances and gray areas when designing and moderating a massive platform dedicated to user-generated content. It’s rarely as clear-cut as the rhetoric makes it sound, from either side. – Lon

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This Week in Startups

E2116: Jason’s calling in from New York for an absolutely JAM-PACKED episode of TWiST. He’s chatting with Alex and Lon about the insane growth curve of AI startup Cursor, evaluating whether or not Uber is using “dark patterns” to hold on to its top customers, AND gauging the long-term effects of tariff uncertainty on the market. PLUS we’ve got a chat with GoShare CEO Shaun Savage on the importance of obsessing about customers AND another exciting Founder Friday match-up.

E2115: We who are about to TWiST salute you! On a Sunday night pre-recorded Easter Weekend special, Jason and Lon look at OpenAI’s hallucinatory new models, behind-the-scenes Meta docs hinting at Zuckerberg’s FB-related woes, and China’s humanoid robot half-marathon. PLUS Alex chats with Thalamus founder Jason Reminick about how he’s helping to match medical residents with the ideal hospitals.

E2114: It’s Friday TWiST! Jason, Alex, and Lon chat about LMArena’s pivot from research project to full-blown company, the rise of application-layer AI startups, and they muse about the future of autonomous drone and weapons systems. PLUS a brand-new “Tips from the Trenches” featuring design and product UX advice from branding expert Scott Bair!

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