alt Hacker NewsI'm wondering: why now, in early 2026? Why not last year? Why not in July? What changed? What does this teach us about Anthropic and what can we infer about their competition?
I'm wondering: why now, in early 2026? Why not last year? Why not in July? What changed? What does this teach us about Anthropic and what can we infer about their competition?
Especially how generous Anthropic has been recently with subscribers - extra usage in December, $50 credit earlier this month, $20 subscription getting access to Opus.
It suggests to me Anthropic is less concerned with the financial impact of letting subscribers use alternative tools and more concerned with creating lock in to their products and subscriptions. It very well might backfire though, I was not considering alternative models yesterday, but today I am actively exploring other options and considering cancelling my sub. I've been using my subscription primarily through pi recently, so if they aren't interested in me as a customer, pretty much everyone else is.