Noah Smith
· Noahpinion
· May 05, 2026 at 06:06
· ⏱ 15 min read
| Read on Substack ↗
Summary
AI industry leaders are pivoting their public messaging from job replacement to human augmentation to counter growing public backlash and the threat of regulation or nationalization. This shift aims to improve the industry's political standing but raises questions about whether the new narrative is genuine or merely a PR strategy, with potential implications for the perceived risk and valuation of AI companies.
•Sam Altman declared AI's purpose is not to take jobs and called AI CEOs 'tone-deaf' for saying otherwise.
•OpenAI's 2026 principles mention AGI only twice, down from 12 times in 2018, and the company removed the AGI clause from its Microsoft agreement.
•Polls show the American public turning strongly against AI, with especially sharp declines among Independents.
•Bernie Sanders is warning about catastrophic AI risk, and Donald Trump is considering an executive order for government oversight of AI models due to cyber concerns.
•Several senators, Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and Palantir's CEO have discussed the possibility of nationalizing AI labs.
•Anthropic has overtaken OpenAI in revenue and market valuation, according to the article, as Dario Amodei continues to predict a job-pocalypse.
•Aaron Levie argues AI will induce demand for more work in areas like security, legal, and media, countering job-loss fears.
•The emerging industry sales pitch focuses on short-term task creation and long-term demand for 'human touch' roles, though the author expresses skepticism about the latter.