I can't think of great interventions for ensuring third-party model access.
Summary I'm increasingly convinced that model access parity is a big deal and we are not on track to achieve it. By model access parity, I mean a small gap between (i) the model access for lab employees and (ii) the model access for external safety researchers, third-party auditors, and other actors trying to make the future go well). See here for an introduction.The basic case is this: (1) Regardless of the strategic landscape, outsiders are well-suited to many crucial activities. (2) Outsiders will be positioned to spend billions of dollars towards making things go well.[1] (3) AI labour seems like the most promising route for spending money to tackle these activities. However, during the months where outsider activities are highest leverage, the best internal models might provide 2-60x more uplift than the best publicly-available models.[2] So without model access parity, this AI labour might be massively less effective.In this post, I attempt to sketch some interventions. But I don't think any of them are great, mostly because they don't seem sticky. I wouldn't be surprised if you can think of something much better.My overall judgementOutsider orgs should try to directly advocate for model access parity to lab employees — both in the general case ("Here's why model access parity for outsiders is good") and their specific case ("Here's why our org in particular needs model access"). Concurrently, we should try to make the case to policymakers and the public — I think, since Mythos, it will be much easier to argue that labs should be compelled to provide the best internal models for certain applications (e.g. "it's like Project Glasswing but for bla"). This combination of advocacy seems pretty reasonable — the first type of advocacy seems suited to orgs which are helping the labs, and the second for orgs which are trying to constrain the labs.Moreover, I think lab employees should push for a more consistent internal policy around access for outsiders. My understand