Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO • Hacker News Board

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#641

Post by tukajo » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:16 PM UTC

tedmiston wrote: post #590

nostrademons wrote: post #557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More confusion - Emmett Shear is a close friend of Sam Altman. He was part of the original 2005 YCombinator class alongside Altman, part of the justin.tv mafia, and later a part-time partner at YCombinator. I don't think he has any such close ties to Dustin Moskovitz. Why would the Dustin-leaning OpenAI board install him as interim CEO? This whole thing still seems to have the air of a pageant to me, where they're ma…

> More confusion - Emmett Shear is a close friend of Sam Altman. He was part of the original 2005 YCombinator class alongside Altman, part of the justin.tv mafia, and later a part-time partner at YCombinator. ... Why would the Dustin-leaning OpenAI board install him as interim CEO? This was my first thought too: Is this a concession of the board to install a Sam friendly-ish Interim CEO? It reads weird on paper.

Is Emmett Shear really "friends" with Sam Altman? He (Emmett) literally liked a tweet the other day that said something to the effect of: "Congratulations to Ilya on reclaiming the corporation that Sam Altman stole". I'm paraphrasing here, but I don't think Emmett and Sam are friends?

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#642

Post by r00tanon » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:16 PM UTC

It's like Game of Thrones - without the intelligent intrigue.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

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Post by smegger001 » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:17 PM UTC

pk-protect-ai wrote: post #458

evantbyrne wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

We cannot ascertain the family circumstances of Altman's family. His sister's allegations are serious, but no legal actions were taken. However, it is surprising to see the treatment of his family, especially considering he is a man who purports to "care" about the world and envisions a bright future for all. Regardless of whether his sister has mental health issues or financial problems, it is unlikely that such a c…

He has tried to help her as even she has admited that he tried to give her a house. When asked for money he had conditions like going back on her medication which she refused and then complained about on social media. Some people dont want helped in ways they need.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#644

Post by Jensson » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:18 PM UTC

clnq wrote: post #210

ar_lan wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In general this can't work. People are notoriously ruthless to people who admit their mistakes. For example, if you are in an argument and you lose (whether through poor debate or your argument is plain wrong), and you *admit it*, people don't look back at it as a point of humility - they look at it as a reason to dog pile on you and make sure everyone knows you were wrong. In this case, it's not internet points - it…

Is this your opinion or is this something that’s an actual theory in sociology or psychology, or at least something people talk about in practice? Not trying to be mean, just to learn. There’s a whole genre of press releases and videos for apologies, so I’m not sure it’s such a reputational risk to admit one is wrong. It might be a bigger risk not to, it would seem. But what you say sounds interesting.

Did you see how people reacted to Ilya apologizing? Read through the early comments here, it isn't very positive they mostly blame him for being weak etc, before he wrote that people were more positive against Ilya but Ilya admitting fault made people home in on it:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38347501&p=2

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#645

Post by JumpCrisscross » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:18 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #625

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #602

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the board would have been able to get rid of the controversy on the spot by spelling out their reasoning I don't think they have an obligation to do this publicly. > even one of the people that voted for Altmans' removal has backtracked I don't have a great explanation for this part of it. > Shareholders and employees of the for-profit were all directly affected by this decision, the insulating properties of a non-…

Capriciousness and board membership are not compatible. The firing of a CEO of a massively successful company is something that requires deliberation and forethought, you don't do that just because you have a bad hairday. So their reasons matter a lot. What I think is happening is that the reason they had sucks, that the documents they have create more liability and that they have a real problem in that one of the ga…

> which he - just as surprising - so far has not done

There were so many conflicts of interests at that firm, I'm not unsurprised by it, either.

> I don't see anything from the board that would suggest that they acted with the kind of forethought and diligence required of a board

We don't know the back-and-forth that led up to this. That's why I'm curious about how quiet one side has been, while the other seemingly launched a coast-to-coast PR campaign. If there had been ongoing negotiations between Altman and others, and then Altman sprung a surprise that went against that agreement entirely, decisive action isn't unreasonable. (Particularly when they literally don't have to consider shareholder value, seemingly by design.)

> they seem to believe they are beyond accountability

Does OpenAI still have donors? Trustees?

I suppose I'm having trouble getting outraged over this. Nobody was duped. The horrendous complexity of the organization was panned from the beginning. Employees and investors just sort of ignored that there was this magic committee at the top of every org chart that reported to "humanity" or whatever.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#646

Post by upwardbound » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:18 PM UTC

SpaceManNabs wrote: post #539

alephnerd wrote: post #84

As I posted elsewhere, I think this is a conflict between Dustin Moskovitz and Sam Altman. Ilya may have been brought into this without his knowledge (which might explain why he retracted his position). Dustin Moskovitz was an early employee at FB, and the founder of Asana. He also created (along with plenty of MSFT bigwigs) a non-profit called Open Philanthropy, which was a early proponent of a form of Effective Alt…

A thing a sad, understated ongoing is that so many people are throwing vitriol at Ilya right now. If the speculation here is true, then he just chased by a mob over pure nonsense (well, at least purer than the nonsense premise beforehand). Gotta love seeing effective altruists take another one on the chin this year though.

But Ilya was the one that started this whole mess... He was the one that lit the match that lit the fuse...

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#647

Post by kylecordes » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:22 PM UTC

jansan wrote: post #244

alephnerd wrote: post #84

As I posted elsewhere, I think this is a conflict between Dustin Moskovitz and Sam Altman. Ilya may have been brought into this without his knowledge (which might explain why he retracted his position). Dustin Moskovitz was an early employee at FB, and the founder of Asana. He also created (along with plenty of MSFT bigwigs) a non-profit called Open Philanthropy, which was a early proponent of a form of Effective Alt…

It has come to the point that hearing the expression "Effective Altruism" sends shivers down my spline.

Obviously we should all want our altruism to be effective. What is the other side of it? Wanting one's altruism to not really accomplish much?

But with everything that has gone on, I cannot imagine wanting to be an Effective Altruist! The movement by that name seems to do and think some really weird stuff.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#648

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:22 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #622

jacquesm wrote: post #608

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're going around in circles I think but to me it is evident that a somewhat competent board that intends to fire the CEO of the company they are supposed to be governing will have a handy set of items ready: a valid reason, minutes of the meeting where all of this was decided where they gravely discuss all of the evidence and reluctantly decide to have to fire the CEO (handkerchiefs are passed around at this point,…

> We're going around in circles I think but to me it is evident that a somewhat competent board that intends to fire the CEO of the company they are supposed to be governing will have a handy set of items ready: a valid reason, minutes of the meeting where all of this was decided, the 'green light' from legal as to whether that reason constitutes sufficient grounds for the dismissal. Those are pre-requisites. I think…

> I think the difference here is that I am fine with your belief that this is what a competent board should have, but I don't think this opinion is the same as actually establishing a legal duty.

I don't think we'll be able to hash this out simply because too many of the pieces are missing. But if the board didn't have those items handy and they end up being incompetent then that by itself may end up as enough grounds to show they violated their duty of care. And this is not some nebulous concept, it actually has a legal definition:

https://www.tenenbaumlegal.com/articles/legal-duties-of-nonp...

I went down into this rabbit hole a few years ago when I was asked to become a board member (but not of a non-profit) and I decided that the compensation wasn't such that I felt that it offset the potential liability.

> The charitable mission is the legal basis for the existence of the corporation and its charity status, and the basis for legal duties and obligations on which both the government (in some cases), and other interested parties (donors, and, for orgs that have them, members) can sue.

Indeed. But that doesn't mean the board is free to act with abandon as long as they hold up the 'charitable mission' banner, they still have to act as good board members and that comes with a whole slew of luggage.

> Given the public information concerning the terms of the operating agreement (the legal basis for the existence and operation of the LLC), unless one of those parties has a non-public agreement with radically contradictory terms (which would be problematic for other reasons), I don't think there can be any case that the OpenAI, Inc., board has a legal duty to any of those parties to see to the profitability of OpenAI Global LLC.

It is very well possible that the construct as used by OpenAI is so well crafted that it insulates board members perfectly from the fall-out of whatever they decide, but I find that hard to imagine. Typically everything down stream from the thing you govern (note that they retain a 51% stake and that that alone may be enough to show that they are in control to the point that they can not disclaim anything) is subject to the duties and responsibilities that board members usually have.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#649

Post by ealexhudson » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:23 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #634

ealexhudson wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, you're rephrasing the question - it was specifically about "control", not "alignment". Even if we substitute "alignment" the problem is that the suggestion is still that Sam would have been "better protected" in some way. A 501(c)3 is just not supposed to function like that, and good corporate governance absolutely demands that the board be independent of the CEO and be aligned to the company goals not the…

> good corporate governance absolutely demands that the board be independent of the CEO CEOs and subordinate executives being on boards are not unusual, and no board (especially a small board) that the CEO (and/or subordinate executives) sits on is independent of the CEO.

By "independent" I don't mean "functions separately". Of course the CEO sits on the board. Sometimes the CFO is on the board too, although subordinate executives usually _should not be_ (they may _attend_ the board, but that's a different thing).

But fundamentally, the CEO _reports to_ the board. That's the relationship. And in a 501(c)3 specifically, the board have a clear requirement to ensure the company is running in alignment with its stated charter.

Whether or not this board got that task right, I don't know, it doesn't seem likely (at least, in hindsight). But this type of board specifically is there for oversight of the CEO, that's precisely their role.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#650

Post by tomjakubowski » Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 10:23 PM UTC

Jensson wrote: post #644

clnq wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this your opinion or is this something that’s an actual theory in sociology or psychology, or at least something people talk about in practice? Not trying to be mean, just to learn. There’s a whole genre of press releases and videos for apologies, so I’m not sure it’s such a reputational risk to admit one is wrong. It might be a bigger risk not to, it would seem. But what you say sounds interesting.

Did you see how people reacted to Ilya apologizing? Read through the early comments here, it isn't very positive they mostly blame him for being weak etc, before he wrote that people were more positive against Ilya but Ilya admitting fault made people home in on it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38347501&p=2

People tend to speak and act very differently in pseudonymous online forums, with no skin in the game, than they ever would in "the real world", where we are constantly reminded of real relationships which our behavior puts at risk.

The only venues where I've witnessed someone being attacked for apologizing or admitting an error have been online.