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Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

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Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#81

Post by poszlem »

ra7 wrote: post #61
minimaxir wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Semi off-topic, but the trend of AI influencers adopting the all-lowercase communication style in professional conversation has been very annoying. It makes them appear completely unserious. I recently received an job recruitment email for an AI role in all-lowercase and I was baffled how to interpret it.

I don’t think it’s only AI influencers that do this. I’ve noticed people use lowercase as some sort of power move. Like they’re so busy and important they don’t care about conventions.

I think you are correct. It's a status symbol at this point. It's the digital version of "inconspicuous consumption" [1].

[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/inconsp...

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#82

Post by thfuran »

squigz wrote: post #69
NotSammyHagar wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reads like more than standard restrictions. I hate those like everyone, they are just intended to chill complaints in my opinion with enough question to scare average people without legal expertise (like me, like most devs), just like non-competes used to seemingly primarily be used to discourage looking at other jobs, separate from whether it was enforceable - note the recent FTC decision to end non-competes. A…

If it's non-enforceable, but you signed it, wouldn't that make the contract void? I suppose there's probably a bunch of legalese to prevent that though...

The legalese to handle that is one of the standard boilerplate clauses: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Severability

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#83

Post by IvyMike »

minimaxir wrote: post #30
0x5f3759df-i wrote: post #2

but sam said he was sorry in all lowercase so it must be okay

Semi off-topic, but the trend of AI influencers adopting the all-lowercase communication style in professional conversation has been very annoying. It makes them appear completely unserious. I recently received an job recruitment email for an AI role in all-lowercase and I was baffled how to interpret it.

Following convention and using standard capitalization rules makes things easier on the reader.

Going to all-lowercase is harder on the reader, and thus is disrespectful of the reader. I will die on this hill.

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#85

Post by dragonwriter »

brookst wrote: post #70
dragonwriter wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they say they are. But the nondisparagement agreement repeatedly forbids revealing the agreement itself, so if it wasn't cancelled those subject to it would be forbidden to point out that the public claim they were going to release people from it was a lie (or done only for people from whom OpenAI was not particularly concerned about potential disparagement.)

“I have not been released from any exit agreement” is not disparagement.

“disparagement" is whatever is defined in the agreement, which reportedly (from one of the people who declined to sign it) includes discussing the existence of the agreement.

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#86

Post by JumpCrisscross »

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #44
tedivm wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have worked for multiple startups (Malwarebytes, Vicarious, Rad AI, Explosion AI, Aptible, Kenna Security). Not once have I seen an exit agreement that stated they would steal back my vested equity if I didn't sign. This is definitely not "standard restrictions".

Comp clawbacks are quite common in finance, at least contractually. It's rare for it to go ahead, but it happens. It isn't some especially weird thing.

> Comp clawbacks are quite common in finance, at least contractually

Never negotiated on exit.

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#87

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #55
nabla9 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if someone not representing ownership directly could just put clauses that alter the ownership and alter shareholder agreements.

Employment letters, with equity grants, are practically never signed by anyone on the board, and for companies of any size, practically never signed by the CEO. There are a bunch of people who can bind a company legally, and it's one of the things they figure as part of their governing docs, board process etc.

Equity grants are usually signed by the board, although a lot of companies treat this as a meaningless formality and present it as though the document your manager signs is the real one. If you take a look at equity grants you've gotten in offer letters in the past, I bet they have "effective on board approval" in there somewhere.

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#88

Post by tomcam »

From Sam Altman:

> this is on me and one of the few times i've been genuinely embarrassed running openai; i did not know this was happening and i should have.

Bullshit. Presumably Sam Altman has 20 IQ points on me. He obviously knows better. I was a CEO for 25 years and no contract was issued without my knowing every element in it. In fact, I had them all written by lawyers in plain English, resorting to all caps and legal boilerplate only when it was deemed necessary.

For every house, business, or other major asset I sold if there were 1 or more legal documents associated with the transaction I read them all, every time. When I go to the doctor and they have a privacy or HIPAA form, I read those too. Everything the kids' schools sent to me for signing--read those as well.

He lies. And if he doesn't... then he is being libeled right and left by his sister.

https://twitter.com/anniealtman108

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#89

Post by nabla9 »

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #68
nabla9 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what I said. The text in the letter must be approved.

Again, wrong. It's just not how the world works. It's legally not required, and in practice not done. If the board and CEO had to sit around approving every contract change in every country, my goodness they'd have no time left for anything else.

I wrote: Every legal clause that affects company ownership is accepted by the CEO and the board.

I did not write: Every legal clause is accepted by the CEO and the board.

Re: Leaked OpenAI documents reveal aggressive tactics toward former employees

#90

Post by ramesh31 »

neglesaks wrote: post #84

I'll make a prediction here: OpenAI will in the coming years turn out just as ruthless and socially damaging as Facebook did.

>OpenAI will in the coming years turn out just as ruthless and socially damaging as Facebook did.

They wish. Napster is a more apt analogy.

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