> Anthropic books the full value of marketplace contracts — sales agreements where customers buy access to Claude through a cloud provider's marketplace — as revenue because it sets prices and delivers the service, while recording the platforms' cut as a marketing cost.
> OpenAI has told investors and employees this approach inflates Anthropic's reported revenue by billions of dollars, Reuters reported in June. Anthropic told Reuters then that it follows established accounting practices, recognizing gross revenue because it is the “principal” in the transaction.
Obviously, OpenAI has a very large financial incentive to criticize their competitor, but it is kind of interesting that they're choosing specifically to attack them on accounting practices because their own IPO prospectus will surely receive the same scrutiny. One might assume that they'd want to avoid the accounting conversation altogether.
I do not understand how this continues. It seems the top end or USAnian business has become dominated by optimists that have lost touch with reality
There is not enough money in the world for three trillion dollar AI companies, AFAICT
Then there are the principles claiming that there is a "10% chance" of their products causing human extinction, and continuing in business. Either they are liars, or they have obscenely little human decency
Yes, but as Patrick Boyle points out, the banks underwriting this IPO are incentivized to make this deal look as big and sexy as possible. What goes up will eventually come down, though.
Related:
Anthropic's IPO prospectus shows AI vision, surging costs
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49886005
> Anthropic books the full value of marketplace contracts — sales agreements where customers buy access to Claude through a cloud provider's marketplace — as revenue because it sets prices and delivers the service, while recording the platforms' cut as a marketing cost.
> OpenAI has told investors and employees this approach inflates Anthropic's reported revenue by billions of dollars, Reuters reported in June. Anthropic told Reuters then that it follows established accounting practices, recognizing gross revenue because it is the “principal” in the transaction.
Obviously, OpenAI has a very large financial incentive to criticize their competitor, but it is kind of interesting that they're choosing specifically to attack them on accounting practices because their own IPO prospectus will surely receive the same scrutiny. One might assume that they'd want to avoid the accounting conversation altogether.
I do not understand how this continues. It seems the top end or USAnian business has become dominated by optimists that have lost touch with reality
There is not enough money in the world for three trillion dollar AI companies, AFAICT
Then there are the principles claiming that there is a "10% chance" of their products causing human extinction, and continuing in business. Either they are liars, or they have obscenely little human decency
What strange times we are living through
Yes, but as Patrick Boyle points out, the banks underwriting this IPO are incentivized to make this deal look as big and sexy as possible. What goes up will eventually come down, though.