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A.I. researchers are negotiating $250M pay packages

nytimes.com

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Re: A.I. researchers are negotiating $250M pay packages

#111

Post by BSOhealth »

These figures are for a very small number of potential people. This leaves out that frontier AI is being developed by an incredibly small number of extremely smart people who have migrated between big tech, frontier AI, and others.

Yes, the figures are nuts. But compare them to F1 or soccer salaries for top athletes. A single big name can drive billions in that context at least, and much more in the context of AI. $50M-$100M/year, particularly when some or most is stock, is rational.

Re: A.I. researchers are negotiating $250M pay packages

#114

Post by InterviewFrog »

fidotron wrote: post #78

Good for those involved being offered such packages, but it really does raise the question of what exactly those offering them are so afraid of. For example, Meta seem to be spending so much so they don't later have to fight a war against an external Facebook-as-chatbot style competitor, but it's hard to see how such a thing could emerge from the current social media landscape.

Here is the uncomfortable truth. Only a small group of people are capable of operating at an elite level. The talent pool is extremely small and the companies want the absolute best.

It is the same thing in sports as well. There will only ever be one Michael Jordan one Lionel Messi one Tiger Woods one Magnus Carlsen. And they are paid a lot because they are worth it.

>> Meta seem to be spending so much so they don't later have to fight a war against an external Facebook-as-chatbot style competitor

Meta moved on from facebook a while back.It has been years since I last logged into facebook and hardly anybody I know actually post anything there. Its a relic of the past.

Re: A.I. researchers are negotiating $250M pay packages

#115

Post by mark_l_watson »

mathgeek wrote: post #79
smokel wrote: post #77

It's similar to how, near the end of a Monopoly game, a player might indiscriminately hand over a stash of $100 bills to acquire Mediterranean Avenue, even though the property is mortgaged.

Which analogy(s) are you going for? The world is about to end so money is essentially worthless? The players with all the money are going to move on to something else soon? The game ceased to be fun for anyone so they all want to find other things to do? I assume you are going for “there are no more useful resources to acquire so those with all the resources overpay just to feel like they own those last few they don’…

I saw the ‘forgetting about money, moving on to other challenges’ thing happen about 30 years ago. A childhood friend sold his company for about 300 million (a billion in today’s dollar devaluation?). My friend and his wife continued to live in their same house. The only thing he did was to purchase eight houses for extended family members who didn’t own their own homes, he also got his daughter expensive horse back riding lessons and a horse, and he said he and his wife drank more expensive wine. He did continue to play “The Infinite Game” by staying in the tech industry - it seemed like he loved the game, the money was only to help other people in his life.

Re: A.I. researchers are negotiating $250M pay packages

#116

Post by mhb »

tough wrote: post #99
qgin wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the idea is the end of the game is nearing (AGI) and specific dollar amounts mean less than the binary outcome of getting there first.

if we get AGI and a post-scarcity age what makes these people think they -reaching- AGI will make them kings. seems like governments will have a thing to say about who's able to run that AGI or not. GPU's run on datacenters which exist in countries

Presumably they think that, whatever chance they have of becoming kings if they get there first is more than the chance if someone else does. In we get AGI, we is doing all the work.

Re: A.I. researchers are negotiating $250M pay packages

#117

Post by AIPedant »

BSOhealth wrote: post #111

These figures are for a very small number of potential people. This leaves out that frontier AI is being developed by an incredibly small number of extremely smart people who have migrated between big tech, frontier AI, and others. Yes, the figures are nuts. But compare them to F1 or soccer salaries for top athletes. A single big name can drive billions in that context at least, and much more in the context of AI. $5…

A very major difference is that top athletes bring in real tangible money via ticket / merch sales and sponsorships, whereas top AI researchers bring in pseudo-money via investor speculation. The AI money is far more likely to vanish.

Re: A.I. researchers are negotiating $250M pay packages

#120

Post by Enginerrrd »

mattlondon wrote: post #107
firesteelrain wrote: post #81

When will the bubble pop?

When more than 1 company has "AGI", or whatever we're calling it, and people realise it is not just a license to print money. Some people are rightly pointing out that for quite a lot of things right now we probably already have AGI to a certain extent. Your average AI is way better than the average schmuck on the street in basically anything you can think of - maths, programming, writing poetry, world languages, mus…

I think the AI is only as good as the person wrangling it a lot of the time. I think it's easy for really competent people to get an inflated sense of how good the AI is in the same way that a junior engineer is often only as good as the senior leading them along and feeding them small chunks of work. When led with great foresight, careful calibration, and frequent feedback and mentorship, a mediocre junior engineer can be made to look pretty good too. But take away the competent senior and youre left pretty lacking.

I've gotten some great results out of LLM's, but thats often because the prompt was well crafted, and numerous iterations were performed based on my expertise.

You couldn't get that out of the LLM without that person most of the time.

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