内容来源：https://www.wired.com/story/uncanny-valley-podcast-anthropic-department-defense-lawsuit-iran-war-memes-artificial-intelligence-venture-capital/

内容总结：

本期《诡异谷》播客聚焦多起科技与政治交叉领域的热点事件。人工智能公司Anthropic因被美国国防部列为“供应链风险”而提起诉讼，称此举已导致其数亿美元的商业合同面临危机，甚至可能造成长期声誉损害。与此同时，特朗普政府在伊朗战争期间于社交媒体大量发布引用影视、动漫片段的“战争梗图”，被批评将冲突娱乐化，其传播策略引发对战时宣传伦理的讨论。

调查报道显示，一家与2021年1月6日国会山集会组织者有关联的活动策划公司，在特朗普重返白宫后获得了价值数千万美元的政府合同，其中多数涉及美国建国250周年庆典项目，其非竞争性投标过程受到质疑。

此外，节目探讨了人工智能对风险投资行业的潜在冲击。尽管风投界长期看好AI技术，但新兴的AI投资分析平台已能自动化完成大量尽调工作，这令“AI取代风投”成为行业内部不得不面对的反讽性议题。

中文翻译：

欢迎收听《诡异谷》播客。本周，我们的主持人将探讨Anthropic公司起诉美国国防部后面临的风险。我们还将分析特朗普政府在社交媒体上分享充满动作感的战争梗图背后的策略，并独家披露一家争议公司如何通过协助组织美国建国250周年庆典活动，获得数百万美元的政府合同。此外：人工智能会取代风险投资家的工作吗？

本期节目提及的文章：

• 《Anthropic声称与五角大楼的纠纷可能使其损失数十亿美元》
• 《特朗普阵营的活动公司通过联邦合同赚取数百万美元》
• 《OpenAI和谷歌员工提交法庭之友简报，支持Anthropic对抗美国政府》
• 《人工智能会终结风险投资家吗？》

您可以在Bluesky上关注布莱恩·巴雷特（@brbarrett）、佐伊·希弗（@zoeschiffer）和莉亚·费格（@leahfeiger）。欢迎发送邮件至uncannyvalley@wired.com与我们联系。

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文字记录
注：此为自动生成的字幕，可能存在误差。

布莱恩·巴雷特：大家好，我是布莱恩。过去几周，佐伊、莉亚和我非常荣幸担任节目新任主持人，我们期待听到您的反馈。如果您喜欢本期节目并有空余时间，请在您使用的播客平台为我们留下评价。这将帮助我们触达更多听众。如有任何问题或意见，请随时发送邮件至uncannyvalley@WIRED.com。感谢收听，节目现在开始。

佐伊·希弗：欢迎收听《连线》杂志的《诡异谷》播客。我是商业与产业板块总监佐伊·希弗。

布莱恩·巴雷特：我是执行主编布莱恩·巴雷特。

莉亚·费格：我是政治新闻高级编辑莉亚·费格。

佐伊·希弗：本周我们将深入探讨Anthropic在被列为供应链风险后起诉美国国防部的事件。我们还将讨论特朗普政府为何要在社交媒体上分享关于伊朗战争的动作电影梗图，以及一家由1月6日集会部分组织者创立、名不见经传的活动公司，如何在特朗普第二任期内赚得盆满钵满。此外，我们也将探讨风险投资家是否该担心被人工智能取代工作。好了，话题很多，我们直接开始吧。Anthropic与国防部的纠葛远未结束，我认为未来数月我们还会持续听到相关消息。本周一，Anthropic对国防部提起诉讼，反对该机构将其列为供应链风险的决定——这对Anthropic的业务损害极大。Anthropic的基本论点是政府侵犯了其言论自由权，诉状中写道：“宪法不允许政府利用其巨大权力，因受保护的言论而惩罚公司。”这是在旧金山提起的诉讼，但该公司在华盛顿特区还同步提起了另一项诉讼，指控国防部存在不公平歧视和报复行为。与此同时，该公司也正在申请临时限制令，以维持与军方合作伙伴的业务往来。

布莱恩·巴雷特：这场对峙依然引人入胜，我认为确实前所未有。这起诉讼有趣之处在于，它首次让我们看到Anthropic承认：“是的，这确实可能让我们损失数亿甚至数十亿美元，因为你们让所有人都不敢与我们合作。”事件爆发后的一两周里，我们得以窥见实际影响究竟有多大。

佐伊·希弗：是的。我认为即使政府未赢得诉讼，此事也已对Anthropic业务造成实质影响。该公司声称，许多即将敲定、利润丰厚的合同正在瓦解，因为潜在合作伙伴表示：“我们还有其他选择，与你们合作风险实在太大了。”

莉亚·费格：他们确实成了众矢之的。即便一年之后，我不确定他们能否摆脱这个污名。无论诉讼结果如何，无论这些合同最终是否回流——即便Claude模型在某些方面更优秀——如果出现两个竞争性投标方案，其中一个是Anthropic，你大概率会选择那个没有激怒总统的公司。

布莱恩·巴雷特：另一方面，消费者正声援Anthropic，称其为“正义的一方”。他们的普通用户月度订阅销量可观，但我不认为这能弥补损失。

佐伊·希弗：没错。企业销售占Anthropic业务的绝大部分。布莱恩，我想补充一点——抱歉打断你——有件事让我很在意：这场风波中我们多次讨论品牌形象与公众认知，Anthropic似乎赢得了良好声誉。但我必须提醒大家注意CEO达里奥·阿莫代那篇博客文章，其中阐述公司与“战争部”的现状。他通篇使用了“战争部”这个称谓。普通人可能不会深究，但我看到时心想：“糟糕，他连机构正确名称都不敢用，因为他太渴望重获对方青睐了。”我认为他当下的妥协姿态比人们想象的更明显。

莉亚·费格：Anthropic首席商务官保罗·史密斯特别指出，商业合作伙伴正在退出或犹豫是否签约。有句话让我印象深刻：“一家金融服务客户因供应链风险标签暂停了1500万美元的交易谈判，另两家领先的金融服务公司则拒绝签署总价值8000万美元的合同，除非获得可单方面无理由取消合同的权利。”消费者声援固然美好，但我不认为任何订阅增长能弥补这种损失。

佐伊·希弗：当然。凯蒂·佩里注册Claude Pro会员可救不了Anthropic的业务。

莉亚·费格：天啊，社交媒体上那个瞬间太不可思议了。我喜欢看到名人参与这类话题，尤其是凯蒂·佩里。这件事包含太多层次，完全满足了我的八卦心理。

布莱恩·巴雷特：在所有表明立场的事件中，这确实是个有趣的插曲：“嘿，Anthropic值得支持。”说到声援，硅谷许多其他公司也站出来支持Anthropic。与其说是出于友谊，不如说是出于“既然能发生在他们身上，也完全可能发生在我们身上”的危机感。本周一，超过30名OpenAI和谷歌员工（包括谷歌DeepMind首席科学家杰夫·迪恩）提交了支持Anthropic的法庭之友简报。微软随后也提交了支持简报。长远来看这未必有用，但至少表明这不仅是一场属于Anthropic的战斗。

莉亚·费格：他们有多大可能让特朗普政府或国防部让步？

布莱恩·巴雷特：可能性极小。因为将公司列为供应链风险的机制，据我所知没有明确的法律挑战途径。身处漩涡中心的五角大楼官员埃米尔·迈克尔表示：“我们不认为Anthropic有任何胜诉可能。”这当然是他的立场，但国防部确实显得信心十足。

莉亚·费格：这个标签在我看来非常严重，就像机票上被标记XXX的乘客。即便最终证明是文书错误，污名也很难短时间内清除。一旦被列为供应链风险，即便你能证明清白，标签也不会轻易消失。

佐伊·希弗：是的，我认为这些影响已超越诉讼结果本身。正如我们所说，它正在破坏Anthropic与潜在合作伙伴的关系。即便在Anthropic似乎领先的编程模型领域，目前最好的Codex模型与Claude Code其实差距很小。如果合作伙伴不愿承担与Anthropic合作的风险，他们确实有其他现实选择。

布莱恩·巴雷特：一些政府机构已经或正在转换供应商，某种程度上证明了转换的可行性。他们提供了“转换也没那么糟”的案例参考。

佐伊·希弗：确实没那么糟。将一切迁移到OpenAI并没有严重的锁定效应。虽然存在定制化工具，但对企业而言，从Anthropic切换到OpenAI大约只需30分钟，并非艰巨的技术任务。

布莱恩·巴雷特：好的，我们会持续关注诉讼进展及Anthropic与国防部的后续动态。但国防部的心思显然不止在AI公司身上。伊朗战争持续发酵，结局难料。特朗普政府似乎都对战事拖延至今感到意外——这怎么可能？截至目前冲突已造成超千人伤亡（其中许多是平民），本期录制时已有7名美军士兵阵亡。市场下跌，油价飙升。而在此期间，政府一直在社交媒体上疯狂发帖。

档案音频：欢迎回家，长官。力量与荣耀。力量与荣耀。失去自由你还能做什么？独行侠即将抵达。

布莱恩·巴雷特：白宫官方X账号一直在发布融合动作电影、电视剧和游戏片段的梗图，包括《龙珠Z》《壮志凌云》《游戏王》等。以下是他们推送内容的典型例子：

档案音频：……一探究竟。全力出击。来了。接招吧。完美胜利。

布莱恩·巴雷特：这只是一个例子，其他内容也大同小异。这些行为正受到合理批评。除了感叹社会现状，还能说什么呢？你能想象温斯顿·丘吉尔发梗图吗？

莉亚·费格：布莱恩，你说得太轻描淡写了。这太可怕了。

布莱恩·巴雷特：确实。

莉亚·费格：真的非常可怕。

布莱恩·巴雷特：不是轻描淡写，我只是……怎么说呢，麻木了，崩溃了。

莉亚·费格：习惯了。

布莱恩·巴雷特：对，习惯了。

莉亚·费格：心累。“温斯顿·丘吉尔会发这种梗图吗？”这真是我今天的灵魂拷问。特朗普政府——通过各个联邦X账号——白宫账号长期以来一直在推送极端内容。自从特朗普重返政坛，国土安全部和移民海关执法局接管明尼阿波利斯与芝加哥期间，他们的回应就充满梗图风格，以令人毛骨悚然的方式迎合时代潮流。全是那种“杰星假日”风格的内容，但主题却是移民。太糟糕了——针对移民！但这次还是让我震惊，即便我每天都被这类内容包围。

佐伊·希弗：我有个问题：战争宣传并非新鲜事。

莉亚·费格：当然。

佐伊·希弗：希望这不是愚蠢的见解——但播客不就是分享见解的平台吗？我很喜欢2023年那本同性历史爱情小说《悼念》，它是我心中的年度佳作。我的读后感之一是：一战时期的年轻人被灌输战争多么光荣辉煌，但真正踏上战场后，他们陷入堑壕战的地狱，身心遭受残酷摧残。他们根本不知道自己在面对什么。这显然是个极端例子，但我想说，政府宣扬“战争多精彩”——现在的区别到底在哪里？我知道有区别，但希望你们能阐述清楚。

布莱恩·巴雷特：我明白你的意思。这是个非常犀利的观点，关乎宣传的演变。如果要实时区分（这总是危险的），我认为征兵宣传与当前行为存在差异——前者或许带有目的性，而后者更像纯粹为了获取转发和点赞，某种程度上显得虚无主义。他们甚至故意未经许可使用影视片段，以此激怒自由派人士，享受“击败他们”的快感。这更像陷入一种循环：重点不是呼吁“加入战争、支持行动”，而是“看我们能多惹人生气”。

莉亚·费格：正是如此。这不是二战时期“女性该进工厂了，这是男性出征时你们的爱国责任”那种宣传，不是《红粉联盟》里各司其职的平行蒙太奇。他们甚至不要求这些，他们要的是愤怒，是转移视线——转移对7名士兵阵亡的注意力，转移对战事似乎无止境的关注，转移对特朗普和皮特·赫格塞斯每次新闻发布会都改变立场的事实。对我来说，这是典型的强人政治手段。佐伊，我同意你的看法。这当然是战时宣传。那么问题或许在于：“目的是什么？”

佐伊·希弗：是的。听你们分析后，我理解的差异在于：如果一战宣传的目的是支持战争，那么现在这种宣传（他们虽不承认）名义上也是支持军事行动。但如果实质目的是煽动愤怒，那就是完全不同的目标。

布莱恩·巴雷特：我认为两者兼有。一方面是煽动愤怒，另一方面——我可能自相矛盾了——但其中透着“为搞笑而做”的态度，仿佛一切皆无意义。所以我们用自由派的作品激怒他们，同时以戏谑的讽刺姿态对待战争，仿佛这一切都不重要。如果你生气，就是你被触怒了——这简直是一种堕落。显然，美化战争本身就有问题，但这更像……

莉亚·费格：这不是美化，是游戏化。

布莱恩·巴雷特：对，百分之百正确。

佐伊·希弗：不愧是布莱恩·巴雷特，连伊朗战争都能扯到版权角度。

布莱恩·巴雷特：我对此很执着。

莉亚·费格：本·斯蒂勒对《热带惊雷》片段被使用感到愤怒，但这正是关键区别所在。无论好坏，传统宣传会说：如果你为正义事业而战，这就是你捍卫的——自由、爱国主义。而现在这些内容暗示：人不是真实的，我们在用卡通；死亡不是真实的，甚至有点可笑。

布莱恩·巴雷特：但并不可笑。

莉亚·费格：一点都不可笑。真的非常、非常可悲。

布莱恩·巴雷特：是的，确实。

莉亚·费格：当特朗普政府通过发帖应对伊朗战争时，我想谈谈《连线》的另一篇独家报道——关于特朗普阵营及其政府合同，我对此十分着迷。佐伊、我和大卫·吉尔伯特、马特·贾尔斯共同撰写的报道本周已在《连线》网站发布。内容是关于一家活动公司如何从政府合同中大幅获利，而该公司关联人曾协助组织2021年1月6日的集会。这家名为“活动策略”的弗吉尼亚州公司已与美国政府签署价值超2600万美元的合同，这还不包括与总务管理局签订的长期合同——未来15年可能价值1亿美元。如果你好奇为什么要关心这家活动公司赚钱的事，我认为这是特朗普阵营关联人从利益输送中获益的首个重大案例。这家成立26年的公司，在特朗普重新执政前的十年里仅获得约5万美元政府合同，而现在却通过竞争极少的招标赚取数百万美元（根据我们的报道）。许多合同与“美国250”庆典相关，这是为期18个月的《独立宣言》签署250周年纪念活动。

布莱恩·巴雷特：我想说两点。第一，你说这是特朗普第二任期首批明显的利益输送案例，但需要补充说明：除了特朗普家族自身，还有很多与其子女的交易值得质疑。第二，令我震惊的是，这显然是对举办1月6日集会（最终演变成民主制度近年最黑暗时刻之一的暴乱）的奖赏。这家公司现在获得数千万、可能超1亿美元的合同，相当于在说“我们会照顾你，干得好”。这不意外，但仍然令人咋舌。

佐伊·希弗：时间线很清晰：他们此前获得少量政府合同，拜登执政期间归零，现在特朗普第二任期又拿到数千万甚至超1亿美元。这家公司的崛起速度惊人。

莉亚·费格：具体来说，例如9月国防部支付“活动策略”近20万美元，用于举办“后院烧烤表演”。许多合同涉及“美国250”庆典——这本是两党共同推动的爱国庆祝活动，虽具政治性但原本是跨党派的。现在由“活动策略”全权负责活动策划，庆典基调已引发民主党人强烈不满，他们质问“钱去哪了”。已有相关优秀报道，而现在我们可以指出：“钱去了这里，涉及这些人，这些合同。”过去几个月，华盛顿特区联邦建筑悬挂着巨幅横幅。我们虽不能百分百确定这与“活动策略”直接相关，但这些印有特朗普肖像、散发强烈格林德沃气息的横幅，也是所谓“美国250”庆典的一部分。说实话，未来几个月我们会看到许多诡异景象。我希望能更文雅地描述，但真的很奇怪，非常奇怪。还有“自由卡车”什么的。

布莱恩·巴雷特：你刚说“格林德沃气息”？

莉亚·费格：是的。

布莱恩·巴雷特：好吧。那是《哈利·波特》里的角色，盖勒特·格林德沃？

莉亚·费格：对。

佐伊·希弗：哇，布莱恩你没读过《哈利·波特》吗？

布莱恩·巴雷特：我读过，只是记不住格林德沃的名字，也忘了他在故事里的定位——我毫不羞愧。

佐伊·希弗：你读得不够熟。

莉亚·费格：是的。任何在华盛顿特区的人现在都能看到司法部大楼上特朗普肖像旁的“让美国再次安全”标语，令人不安。谈论起来近乎滑稽，但确实令人不安。我们的记者玛凯娜·凯利在特区实地观察，这些横幅遍布全城，改变了城市氛围。这真是个特别的选择。

布莱恩·巴雷特：教育部大楼挂着查理·柯克的横幅——我记得他强烈主张“不应该存在教育部”。所以确实一团糟。这也预示了今年夏季更多庆典活动的基调。我猜白宫草坪上会有UFC格斗赛之类的事情。总之会很有趣，而这家公司很可能处于风暴中心。

莉亚·费格：绝对如此。需要明确的是，联邦合同授予本应有竞争机制，即所谓的“竞争条款”，旨在避免偏袒。这些合同在没有充分竞争的情况下授予，本身就令人担忧。我们将密切关注特朗普阵营及其他关联人的后续动向。这可能只是利益输送现象的开端，但我毫不怀疑特朗普任内不会只有这一例。

佐伊·希弗：好的。进入休息前，我要把话题拉回我的最爱——人工智能。关于AI颠覆某些行业工作的讨论和证据已有很多，但鲜有群体比风险投资家更热衷于押注这项技术。然而事实证明，VC们自己在不远的未来也可能被AI取代。本周我们发表了阿里尔·帕尔代斯关于“自主交易投资网络”（ADIN）平台的报道。该平台于2025年推出，利用AI代理完成通常由人类分析师负责的风险投资交易工作。输入初创企业的融资演示文档，ADIN就能输出对其商业模式、创始团队、尽职调查问题清单及合规风险的详细分析——这些工作通常需要分析师数日甚至数周，而ADIN仅需一两小时。当AI代理看好某个初创企业时，甚至会建议基金应分配多少投资额度。当然，之后仍需要人类进行尽职调查，但这预示了未来可能的方向。AI代理可能颠覆VC本身，这无疑具有讽刺意味。

布莱恩·巴雷特：讽刺是我最爱的部分。风险投资家常将自己定位为免疫AI影响的特例，认为机器无法取代他们，因为这是艺术而非科学。在他们看来，AI能取代所有工作，但VC是例外。这种“梯子恰好在VC脚下终止”的想法既有趣又可笑。我好奇现在有多少人实际使用ADIN，尤其VC们似乎对此持怀疑态度。目标用户是谁？它真的获得市场认可了吗？

佐伊·希弗：ADIN的运作模式是派出“侦察员”寻找潜在交易，侦察员可从交易中获利。所以VC可能不会直接采用这个网络，但人们可以绕过他们，使其必要性降低。阿里尔在文章中还指出另一个讽刺点：如果你能仅凭自己和一堆AI代理创办公司，通过“氛围编程”走向成功，那从一开始还需要那么多风险投资吗？

莉亚·费格：我不知道。人们对AI取代工作的恐惧太多了，感觉每隔一篇文章就在说“这些人紧张，那些人紧张”。布莱恩说得对，有趣

英文来源：

This week on Uncanny Valley, our hosts look at what’s at stake for Anthropic after the company sued the Department of Defense. They also take a look at the strategy behind the Trump administration sharing action-filled war memes on social media, and share a scoop about how a controversial company is taking in millions in government contracts by helping organize America250 celebrations. Plus: Could AI come for the jobs of venture capitalists?
Articles mentioned in this episode:

• Anthropic Claims Pentagon Feud Could Cost It Billions
• A Trumpworld Events Company Is Raking In Millions in Federal Contracts
• OpenAI and Google Workers File Amicus Brief in Support of Anthropic Against the US Government
• Can AI Kill the Venture Capitalist?
  You can follow Brian Barrett on Bluesky at @brbarrett, Zoë Schiffer on Bluesky at @zoeschiffer, and Leah Feiger on Bluesky at @leahfeiger. Write to us at uncannyvalley@wired.com.
  How to Listen
  You can always listen to this week's podcast through the audio player on this page, but if you want to subscribe for free to get every episode, here's how:
  If you're on an iPhone or iPad, open the app called Podcasts, or just tap this link. You can also download an app like Overcast or Pocket Casts and search for “uncanny valley.” We’re on Spotify too.
  Transcript
  Note: This is an automated transcript, which may contain errors.
  Brian Barrett: Hey, it's Brian. Zoë, Leah and I have really enjoyed being your new hosts these past few weeks, and we want to hear from you. If you like the show and have a minute, please leave us a review in the podcast or app of your choice. It really helps us reach more people, and for any questions and comments, you can always reach us at uncannyvalley@WIRED.com. Thank you for listening. On to the show.
  Zoë Schiffer: Welcome to WIRED's Uncanny Valley. I'm Zoë Schiffer, director of business and industry.
  Brian Barrett: I'm Brian Barrett, executive editor.
  Leah Feiger: And I'm Leah Feiger, senior politics editor.
  Zoë Schiffer: This week, we're diving into Anthropic's lawsuit against the Department of Defense after the company was labeled as a supply chain risk. We're also discussing why on earth the Trump administration is sharing action film memes about the war in Iran and how a little known events company formed by some of the organizers of the January 6th rally is making bank in Trump's second term in office. Also, we'll talk about whether venture capitalists should be worried about AI taking their jobs. OK. We have a ton to get into, so let's just dive right in. The saga between Anthropic and the Department of Defense is far from over. I actually think we're going to be hearing about this for many, many months to come. On Monday, Anthropic filed a lawsuit against the DOD pushing back against the agency's decision to label the company as a supply chain risk, which is pretty detrimental to Anthropic's business. Anthropic is basically arguing that the government is infringing upon its free speech rights, saying, quote, "The Constitution does not allow the government to wield its enormous power to punish a company for its protected speech." Now, that's the lawsuit that Anthropic filed in San Francisco, but there's another accompanying lawsuit that it filed in DC, which accuses the DOD of unfairly discriminating and retaliating against Anthropic. In the meantime, the company is also seeking a temporary restraining order to continue working with its military partners.
  Brian Barrett: This continues to be just a fascinating face-off and I think really unprecedented. What's interesting about the lawsuit to me too is I think it was our first look at Anthropic acknowledging, "Yeah, this is actually going to potentially cost us hundreds of millions, maybe billion dollars because you're making it so that nobody wants to work with us." It's been a look at just how actual the impact has been in the week or two since this started.
  Zoë Schiffer: Yeah. The government actually doesn't need to win the lawsuit, I don't think, for this to really impact Anthropic's business, because the company is claiming that already a bunch of its contracts that were about to close, very, very lucrative contracts, are falling apart as potential partners are saying, "Wow, we have other options and it's frankly way too risky to work with you."
  Leah Feiger: No, they've made them a lightning rod. And I don't know that even in a year from now, I'm not sure that they're going to be able to get the stink of this off them. No matter how the lawsuit resolves, no matter if these contracts end up coming their way back, just because Claude happens to be better, X, Y, and Z. It doesn't matter if there are two competitive bids, Anthropic is one of them, you might as well go with the people who aren't pissing off the president right now.
  Brian Barrett: And on the other end of it, you've got consumers rallying around Anthropic and saying, "This is the good one." And so their usage in terms of they're selling a lot of monthly subscriptions to your average Joe, but I don't see a world in which those make up the gap.
  Zoë Schiffer: Yeah. Enterprise sales are the vast majority of Anthropic's business. And I want to say one other thing, Brian, and sorry to cut you off, but it's driving me insane because we've been talking a lot about branding and perception as this fight has gone on and how the Anthropic has come out looking really good. But I have to bring your attention to that blog post that Dario Amodei, the CEO, published that was basically where things stand with the Department of War. And he did say Department of War. He used that language all throughout. I don't think the average person looked at that and thought he's grappling, but I looked at it and was like, "Oh, no, he can't even use the proper name for the agency because he is so desperate to get back in their good graces." And I actually think he's doing a lot more of that than people think right now.
  Leah Feiger: The Anthropic Chief Commercial Officer, Paul Smith, specifically said the commercial partners are concerned in backing out or hesitant to make deals. This quote stayed with me. He said, "A financial services customer paused negotiations over a $15 million deal because of the supply chain label, and two leading financial services companies have refused to close deals valued together at $80 million unless they gain the right to unilaterally cancel their contracts for any reason." I think that it's lovely that consumers might be rallying around them, but I'm not sure that any sort of subscription push is going to make up for this.
  Zoë Schiffer: No. Katy Perry signing up for Claude Pro, or whatever that tier is called, is not going to save Anthropic's business.
  Leah Feiger: I'm sorry. That was an unbelievable moment on social media. I love when celebrities get involved. I love when it's Katy Perry that gets involved. There's just so many different parts of that. It scratched every single itch for me.
  Brian Barrett: Yeah. Of all the things that take a stand over in this moment, it is a fun, "You know what? Anthropic." I will say in terms of taking a stand too, we've seen a lot of other companies in Silicon Valley come to Anthropic's defense here. I think maybe less out of a sense of buddy-buddiedom than a sense of, "Oh, if it can happen to them, it can definitely happen to us." So we had more than 30 employees from OpenAI and Google, including Google DeepMind's Chief Scientist, Jeff Dean, filed a brief on Monday in support of Anthropic. Microsoft followed up, filed their own brief in support of Anthropic. I don't know that that's going to actually do anything in the long run, but it does signal at least that this is a fight that more than just Anthropic is willing to have.
  Leah Feiger: What are the chances here that they get the Trump administration to back down, that they get DOD to back down?
  Brian Barrett: I think very, very small. I think just because the way that this is structured, and when you go to designating the company as a supply chain risk, the mechanisms that do that, there's not a clear, at least as far as I'm aware, way to legally challenge that. Emil Michael, who has been at the center of this for the Pentagon, has said, "We don't see a way in which this shakes out where Anthropic has a case," which of course he's going to say that, but I do think DOD seems very confident.
  Leah Feiger: That label is so serious to me. It really feels like the people that get the XXX on their airplane tickets. And even if it ended up being some clerical error, you can't get those taken off for a long time. You're a supply chain risk, that doesn't just get expunged if you're able to prove otherwise.
  Zoë Schiffer: Yeah, that's the stuff that I think is beyond the outcome of the lawsuit. It's already damaging Anthropic's relationship with potential partners, like we said. And I think because the product is so close, even if you're talking about coding models where Anthropic seems to have the lead, the best Codex model is actually quite close to Claude Code at this point. And so I do think partners have a very real alternative to turn to if they don't want to take on the risk of working with Anthropic in this moment.
  Brian Barrett: And a bunch of government agencies have already made the switch or are making the switch and in some ways just showing that it's possible to do. They're providing case studies that it's maybe not that bad.
  Zoë Schiffer: No, no, it's not that bad. And there's not a huge lock-in effect to switch everything over to OpenAI. I'm sure some, there's been custom tooling that's built, but for the most part, if you as a business want to switch from Anthropic to OpenAI, 30 minutes. It's not a huge technical task.
  Brian Barrett: All right. Well, we're going to keep an eye on what happens with the lawsuits and any future anthropic DOD developments. But the DOD has more on its mind than AI companies. Obviously, the war on Iran continues to unfold with increasing uncertainty of how long it will last. It seems as though even the Trump administration is surprised that it has gone even this long—which, how is that possible? Trump administration being criticized for more than 1,000 casualties inflicted so far in this conflict—many of them civilians—seven US service members as of this recording. Markets are falling, oil prices spiking. Through it all, the administration has been posting. They've been posting like there's no tomorrow, which I say that almost literally.
  Archival Audio: Welcome home, sir. Strength and honor. Strength and honor. What will you do without freedom? Maverick's inbound.
  Brian Barrett: The official White House X account has been posting memes incorporating clips from action movies, TV shows, video games. You've got Dragon Ball Z, you've got Top Gun, you've got Yu-Gi-Oh. There's just a lot going on here. Here's a little example of the kind of stuff that's hitting their feed.
  Archival Audio: ... to find out. Maximum effort. Here it comes. Now, take this. Flawless Victory.
  Brian Barrett: That's just one example. They're all kind of like that, and they are being rightly criticized. I think what to say other than that, quite a statement on where we are at societally. Can you imagine Winston Churchill posting memes?
  Leah Feiger: Brian, you're being so casual about it. This is horrific.
  Brian Barrett: Oh, yeah.
  Leah Feiger: This is really, really horrific.
  Brian Barrett: I wouldn't say casual. I would say I am—what is it? Inured, just broken down.
  Leah Feiger: Used to it.
  Brian Barrett: Used to it. Yeah.
  Leah Feiger: Broken. I did like the, "Would Winston Churchill be posting these memes?" It's really the question of the day for me. The Trump administration—between different federal X accounts—the White House accounts have been pushing really unhinged stuff for a very long time now. Since Trump returned to office, the amount of things during DHS and ICE's takeover of Minneapolis and Chicago, their response to that was very much meme-y, it was very much trying to hit the zeitgeist in very creepy ways. It was all of these like, "The Jetstar holiday," but about immigrants. It was horrible—about immigrants! This is a new one for me though. Even I am inundated with this content on a daily basis and I've been shocked.
  Zoë Schiffer: I have a question though, because war propaganda is not new.
  Leah Feiger: For sure.
  Zoë Schiffer: I hope this isn't the dumbest take ever, but what is a podcast for, if not sharing your dumb takes? I loved the book In Memoriam—gay historical romance from 2023. It was one of my top books. And one, my takeaway from that book was, wow, young men during World War I were inundated with information about how glorious and amazing the war was. And then they went out to fight and they were in trench warfare, which is literally hell. And they were just completely emotionally, physically, spiritually brutalized by that experience. They had no idea what they were getting into. And that's obviously a very extreme example, but I'm just saying, a government saying, "Look how amazing this is"—what is the difference here? I know there is one, but I want you to articulate what it is.
  Brian Barrett: No, I hear that. I think that's a really smart point that it's the evolution of propaganda. I would say, if I'm going to draw a distinction in real time, which is always dangerous, I think there's a difference between recruiting efforts, which maybe those were, where this feels more directionally toward just to get reposts and likes for their own sake. It feels a little bit nihilistic in that sense. And if anything, they use a lot of clips without permission, and that's intentional too, to generate outrage from the libs so you can own them. It just feels like it is caught in the cycle less about saying, "Come join the war effort and support this," and more about, "Look how mad we can make people."
  Leah Feiger: And I think that's exactly it. This isn't just a World War II, "Women, it's time for you to get to the factories. This is your patriotic duty while the men are off fighting." This is not League of Their Own, split screen, everyone's doing their part. And that's not even what they're asking for. They're asking for that outrage. They're asking for that anger that perhaps distracts from the fact that seven service members have died thus far, distracts from the fact that this doesn't appear to have an end in sight, that Trump actually changes his mind with every other press conference, as does Pete Hegseth. To me, it's a very strong man approach. I'll give you that, Zoë. Absolutely. This is wartime propaganda. And so perhaps then the conversation is like, "To what end?"
  Zoë Schiffer: Yeah. I think that that's the difference that makes sense to me as you guys are talking. If the purpose of World War I propaganda was support for the war effort, they're saying the purpose of this propaganda is also—they're not calling it that—but is also support for the military effort. But if it's in fact outrage, that's a very different aim.
  Brian Barrett: I think it's a combination of that. I think it's the outrage. And then I might be contradicting myself here too, but I think there's a do it for the LOLs kind of attitude about it where nothing means anything. So we're going to rile up the libs by using their stuff. And at the same time, we're going to have this winky ironic detachment from war where none of this actually means anything. And if you get upset, it's because you're triggered, which just feels debasing. Obviously, there are problems with glorifying how great war is. This seems to be more just like—
  Leah Feiger: This isn't glorifying it. It's gamifying it.
  Brian Barrett: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yep, 100 percent.
  Zoë Schiffer: Trust Brian Barrett to find a copyright angle on the war in Iran.
  Brian Barrett: I'm obsessed with that.
  Leah Feiger: Ben Stiller was angry about Tropic Thunder being used, but that is the important difference to me. There is something, whereas for better or for worse, the idea of, if you go off to fight for this very just cause, this is what you're fighting for. You're fighting for freedom, you're fighting for patriotism. And this is saying people aren't real. We're using cartoons here. These deaths are not real and more than that, they're kind of funny.
  Brian Barrett: But not that funny.
  Leah Feiger: But not funny. Really, really not funny, you guys. This is very, very sad.
  Brian Barrett: Yeah. No. Yeah, yeah.
  Leah Feiger: So as the Trump administration is posting their way through the Iran war, I want to talk about a different WIRED scoop that we have that's been looking at Trumpworld and looking at a number of government contracts that I am obsessed with. Zoë and I did this story along with David Gilbert and Matt Giles on WIRED.com published this week. And it's about how an events company whose associates helped organize the January 6th, 2021 rally has been majorly benefiting from government contracts. The company, called Event Strategies, is based in Virginia and has signed contracts worth over $26 million with the US government. That's without taking into account a more long-term contract with the General Services Administration that could be worth up to $100 million over the next 15 years. If you're wondering why on earth should I care about this events company and the fact that they're making money, this to me is one of the first big examples we've seen of associates in Trumpworld benefiting from the grift. And this company—it's a 26-year-old company—it received about $50,000 in government contracts over the past decade before getting all of this money once Trump reentered office. And now they're making millions from contracting bids that have received very little competition according to our reporting. A lot of these contracts are related to America250, which is an 18-month-long commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
  Brian Barrett: I want to say two things. One is you say that this is one of the first apparent grifty relationships in the second Trump administration. I think we should qualify that by saying outside of Trump's own family, a lot of deals with the boys—
  Leah Feiger: For sure.
  Brian Barrett: —that you could raise an eyebrow at. The second thing is, what struck me about this is that it feels so clearly a reward for putting on the Jan 6th rally that led to the Jan 6th riot that was one of the darkest days in democracy and recent memory. And the idea that this company is now getting tens of millions, potentially more than $100 million of contracts as a, "We'll take care of you, good job," it's not surprising. Again, so little of this is surprising, but it is still remarkable.
  Zoë Schiffer: To go over the timeline, they get a few government contracts and the Biden administration comes in zero government contracts. And now Trump 2 is happening and millions, if not more than 100 million. That's a really big rise for this firm.
  Leah Feiger: To get into the specifics, some of these contracts, for example, in September, DOD paid Event Strategies almost $200,000 for what was listed as a backyard cookout and performance. Again, a lot of them related to America250, started as a bipartisan effort, we're going to be celebrating this country. That doesn't feel very—sure, it's inherently political, but it was bipartisan. And then to have Event Strategies come in and be entirely in charge, basically, of doing the event planning behind this. The tenor of these celebrations have already gotten a lot of consternation from Democrats who were like, "Where is this money going?" There was some great reporting on that. And now we're able to say, "This is where it's going. These are the people involved. These are the contracts." Over the last few months, these large banners throughout DC have been hanging from federal buildings all over. We weren't able to say with 100 percent certainty that this is exactly tied to Event Strategies, but those banners that feature Trump's face and give off very serious Grindelwald vibes are part of this supposed America250 celebration as well. We're in for a couple of months of some very weird stuff, honestly. I wish I could be more eloquent than that, but it's odd. It's very odd stuff. There's freedom trucks.
  Brian Barrett: Did you just say Grindelwald vibes?
  Leah Feiger: I did say Grindelwald vibes.
  Brian Barrett: OK. And that is a Harry Potter character, Gellert Grindelwald?
  Leah Feiger: Yes.
  Zoë Schiffer: Wow. Brian, have you not read Harry Potter?
  Brian Barrett: No, I've read Harry Potter. I'm just saying I'm not able to pull Gellert as the first name of Grindelwald. And also, I do forget who Grindelwald was in the Harry Potter lore, and I'm not ashamed of it.
  Zoë Schiffer: You haven't read it enough. You haven't read it enough.
  Leah Feiger: Yes. For anyone that's in DC right now that's seeing Trump's visage next to Make America Safe Again on DOJ, the DOJ building, the federal building, it's unnerving. It's almost comical to talk about, but it's very unnerving. Our reporter Makena Kelly has been walking around DC just looking at this. These banners are hanging all over and it's changed the tenor of the city. It's quite a choice.
  Brian Barrett: And at the Department of Education, you've got banner hanging there, Charlie Kirk. I believe I'm right in saying, "Believe strongly that there should not be a Department of Education." So yeah, it is a mess. And again, I think, speaks to what we can expect from further celebrations this summer. I think we're looking at a UFC fight on the White House lawn, things of that nature. So no, it's going to be interesting. And then I'm sure this company will be at the center of a whole lot of it.
  Leah Feiger: Absolutely. And again, just to be so clear, getting contracts, the way that getting federal contracts work is there has to be a competitive system. There is CICA, which is known as the competition clause, basically. There is supposed to be that to avoid favoritism. So the fact that all of these contracts were given without serious competition is also a cause for concern, and something that we're going to be paying really close attention to going forward with other Trumpworld and Trump associates. This might be the beginning of an apparent grifty nature, whatever we're looking at, but I have no doubt it's not going to be the last for Trump too.
  Zoë Schiffer: OK. Before we go to break, I am going to wrench the conversation back to my favorite topic, which is artificial intelligence. So you guys, there has been a lot of talk and some evidence of AI disrupting jobs in certain industries, but few groups have been more bullish on betting on this technology than venture capitalists. But it turns out that VCs could potentially be replaced by AI themselves in the not too distant future. So we published a story this week by Arielle Pardes about a platform called ADIN, the Autonomous Deal Investing Network, which was launched in 2025. And it basically uses AI agents to do the work of human analysts that would typically be involved in venture deal making. If you put in a startup's pitch deck, out comes a very detailed analysis of its business model, its founding team, a list of diligence questions and compliance risks. This is stuff that can take analysts days, if not weeks, and ADIN can do in an hour or two. And then when the agents like a startup, they actually suggest how much ADIN's fund should allocate toward the deal. Of course, then humans come in and do their due diligence, but I think it's a very interesting look at where things could be headed. And obviously, there's irony in the fact that agents could disrupt VCs themselves.
  Brian Barrett: The irony is my favorite part because I feel like venture capitalists have largely positioned themselves as immune to the effects of AI because they're very special and surely a machine can—
  Zoë Schiffer: It's art, not science.
  Brian Barrett: Yeah. It's art, not science. Machines can take every job, but not us. The ladder stops just below VC for them in a way that is entertaining and fun. So I wonder how many people are actually using this now, especially because venture capitalists themselves are so skeptical of it, it seems like. Who's the audience? Is it finding real traction out there?
  Zoë Schiffer: Yeah. So the way that ADIN works is they have scouts that go out and look for potential deals, and then those scouts can make money on said deals. So I think this would be something where VCs wouldn't necessarily be adopting the network, but people would be going around them and they wouldn't be as necessary, as useful. I think there was another great irony, which Arielle pulled out in her piece, which is that also, if you can start a company with just yourself and a bunch of AI agents, you're vibe coding your way to success, do you even need all of that venture capital money to begin with?
  Leah Feiger: I don't know. There's so much to me, there's so much fear about AI taking jobs. I feel like every other article that is like, "And these people are nervous and these people are nervous." Brian's right, the part that is funny is these are the folks that have just gone all in on AI, but I'm still waiting. I'm still waiting for AI to take the jobs. Has it yet? Will it yet?
  Zoë Schiffer: Yeah. I think that there's recent research. I was talking to Will Knight, one of our fantastic AI reporters about this yesterday, and he was saying, "Look, the evidence just isn't there yet for many, many industries. The hype has, as it often does, gone way out ahead of the actual data here. We don't know that AI is taking jobs." But I will say being in San Francisco, I am hearing a lot of people say engineering teams in particular are very bloated right now. Agents can actually do a lot of the work and you definitely need humans on top managing those agents, but you could cut a lot of teams by 80 percent, 50 percent, 60 percent. And so I think that we are going to see more AI-related job loss first in engineering and then in other sectors.
  Brian Barrett: Marc Andreessen, famous venture capitalist, cofounder of Andreessen Horowitz, said this very thing in a recent podcast. Listen to how special he thinks his own profession is.
  Marc Andreessen, archival audio: Every great venture capitalist in the last 70 years has missed most of the great companies of his generation. If it was a science, you could eventually have somebody who just dials it in and gets 8 out of 10, but in the real world, it's not like that. It's just you're in the fluke business. And so there's an intangibility to it. There's a taste aspect, the human relationship aspect, the psychology. And I don't want to be definitive, but it's possible that that is quite literally timeless. And when the AIs are doing everything else, that may be one of the last remaining fields that people are still doing.
  Brian Barrett: I'll say these are the same people who think that AI can replace writers and artists, but it's VC that has that intangibility and that artistic process that really matters. It's rich. It's a rich text.
  Zoë Schiffer: He sounds exactly like us when we're explaining why AI could never replace a human editor. We're like, "There's a taste aspect. AI could never."
  Brian Barrett: So we're right. We're right though.
  Zoë Schiffer: I know. I know.
  Leah Feiger: Did I ever tell you guys about when I saw Marc Andreessen at a play?
  Zoë Schiffer: Oh, yes.
  Leah Feiger: It's pertinent here because the play was called McNeal and it starred Robert Downey Jr. And it was about this novelist, this award-winning novelist who used AI to write his books. And the play gets into all of this. It gets into AI, reality. It gets into difficult family conversations, plagiarism, health, but all of this very much wrapped in and with the question of who can AI replace? What can AI replace? Well, humans understand that. So the fact that Marc Andreessen is sitting in front of me and Steven at this play as he is going on to make all of these statements, and this was his takeaway. We went in and had just such different experiences and takeaways. I'm going to think about that for a very, very long time. We consumed the same culture for a solid three hours.
  Brian Barrett: Meanwhile, I think venture capitalists probably do have more to worry about from a looming recession than from ADIN anytime soon.
  Leah Feiger: Yes.
  Brian Barrett: Coming up after the break, we're going to share our WIRED/TIRED picks for the week. So stay with us.
  Zoë Schiffer: It's time for our WIRED/TIRED segment. Whatever is new and cool is WIRED, duh. And whatever is passé, whatever we're over is TIRED. OK. Are we ready?
  Leah Feiger: Yes. Very ready.
  Brian Barrett: I'm ready.
  Zoë Schiffer: Brian, you go first.
  Brian Barrett: TIRED is Grindelwald. No, TIRED—
  Zoë Schiffer: No.
  Brian Barrett: Whoever he is. No, my TIRED is flying cars. Yeah. Eight regions across the United States are going to be taking part in a three-year pilot program that is going to actually let these electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft, these flying car-type of vehicles, take to the skies. I think they're dumb. I think they're going to be basically helicopters, but more. I don't know. I don't really see the point of it other than to give very wealthy people a slightly shorter way to get places and to messy up our skies. So I'm TIRED of them already before they even take to the skies. And then WIRED, I'm going to say hybrid vehicles.
  Zoë Schiffer: Wow.
  Brian Barrett: The US has spent so long going away from electric and hybrid because oil prices were low, because the administration loves oil, but I think the current situation, Iran and spiking oil prices, is a good reminder that we cannot keep clinging to this as a way to power our cars. I wish there were more hybrid vehicles on the market. In the US, there aren't. So this is a WIRED and also a plea to get people to make them again.
  Leah Feiger: OK, that's a good one. I'm interested in that. Can I go?
  Zoë Schiffer: Please.
  Leah Feiger: My WIRED is the fact that I'm not wearing this massive puffer coat right now anytime I leave the house in New York. It is finally becoming less horrific outside. It was a really, really rough two months, you guys. It was so cold, it was snowy, and then there was a ton of rain, and then it was super cold again. Meanwhile, all of our apartments are so hot because it's all this intense building heating, you're just opening windows. It feels ridiculous. I felt ill for the last two months. My TIRED though is vaguely depressing, which is on Monday it was the hottest day in record in March so far in New York, which is really concerning, climate change and all. I'm so excited to throw away my puffy coats and boots into the back of the closet for a couple more months, but it feels hard to celebrate this early, I'll be honest.
  Zoë Schiffer: That's real. OK. I don't know if this—I feel like I keep expanding the definition of WIRED and TIRED. And Leah keeps saying, "What are you talking about?" But I'm going to try. OK. TIRED is the discourse regarding quizzes that are supposed to tell you if you prefer AI writing to human writing.
  Leah Feiger: This is good.
  Zoë Schiffer: I feel like this entire conversation misunderstands how people actually consume content and consume art, most of all, which is that we are influenced by knowing about who wrote something and that you having a visceral and negative reaction to reading something that you later realize was created by AI is actually a legitimate part of that experience. And that just seeing something in a vacuum, it's not how humans consume things. I think WIRED is the take by Claire Dederer who wrote Monsters, which I thought was a very smart assessment of this very issue. And she argued. This was a "Can you separate the art from that artist” argument. And she talks about it like a stain, that even if you want to separate art from artists, it is like a stain that sticks with it. And while you can still watch those movies, read those books by someone you think is a reprehensible human, it ends up influencing you for good or bad. I think that's valid.
  Leah Feiger: That's our show for today. We're going to link to all the stories we spoke about today in the show notes. If you have any comments, you can find the episode transcripts at WIRED.com to discuss. Uncanny Valley is produced by Kaleidoscope Content. Adriana Tapia produced this episode. It was mixed by Amar Lal at Macro Sound. It was fact checked by Daniel Roman. Pran Bandi is our New York studio engineer. Mark Leyda is our San Francisco studio engineer. Kimberly Chua is our digital production senior manager. Kate Osborn is our executive producer, and Katie Drummond is WIRED's global editorial director.