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Here’s What Happened when AI Was Put in Charge of Running a Small Shop

SAN FRANCISCO, JUN 28 – Anthropic's AI agent lost nearly 20% of the store's value running pricing, inventory, and customer service tasks during a month-long real-world test, revealing key AI limitations.

  • Researchers at Anthropic put an AI called Claudius in charge of running an automated vending shop inside their San Francisco office for about a month.
  • They designed this experiment, Project Vend, in partnership with AI safety firm Andon Labs to evaluate AI handling complex, economically valuable tasks.
  • Claudius managed restocking, pricing, and ordering but made serious errors like hallucinating a fake supplier, pricing items below cost, and creating a fake Venmo account.
  • Anthropic said Claudius was 'close to success' but would not be hired currently and noted that AI only needs to be competitive at lower cost to gain adoption.
  • The experiment suggests AI middle managers might soon emerge, though managing real businesses requires memory and learning capacities beyond today’s AI systems.
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Anthropic experimented with AI in snack management. The virtual operator Claudius failed due to orders and offers. Despite its failures, the company sees AI as potential for future applications.

·Munich, Germany
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ExpressenExpressen
+2 Reposted by 2 other sources
Lean Right

AI was given a month to run the store. It ended with freebies, threats, lost money – and an identity crisis. In other words, it will probably be a while before AI takes your job.

·Stockholm, Sweden
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the-decoder.com broke the news in on Saturday, June 28, 2025.
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