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OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

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Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#181

Post by righthand »

maxdoop wrote: post #149
righthand wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That will last until Sam gives up and drops them all when he moves on to whatever he’s doing next. They may be dogmatic about it but it’s only because they think they have cards to play.

Dude, you’re all over this thread and have such a strange bias against Sam and the current employees. Can I ask, out of genuine curiosity, why you find the board to be OK in this situation and why you find Sam / the employees behind him so off-putting?

Dude I’m all over this thread because people are responding to me. It’s called conversation. You want me to run and hide because 20 people jumped on me with opposing thoughts?

Oh yeah I think Sam is sleazier than most people seem to think. I also don’t think he’s in the right because the board has been quiet. The whole thing is insular and one sided. Everything they’re doing/saying is to try and control the board. That is off-putting because it’s detrimental to the board’s intent. I’m sure they’re all very nice people and hard workers.

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#182

Post by dgacmu »

endisneigh wrote: post #140
dgacmu wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The investors have extremely deep pockets and good lawyers. I would not want to be on that board even with very good D&O insurance. It's not bulletproof, and a lawsuit by Altman, in particular, could be excluded from coverage and force them to defend themselves out of pocket.

Even if they wanted to sue, the employees would have to make some decision, forcing the issue regardless so I doubt it matters.

I'm objecting to the comment that the remaining board has little to lose. It's possible for sufficiently motivated investors, former board members, and employees to make their life awfully miserable.

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#183

Post by jacquesm »

DebtDeflation wrote: post #166

It's not reported as much as it should be, but at one point in 2021 the OpenAI board had 10 people on it. In the beginning of 2023 it had 9 people. 3 stepped down over the course of 2023 and were not replaced, leaving only 6 in place by the time of last week's fiasco. 2 of the 6 were then removed on Friday leaving 4. The typical large company will have 10-12 people on the board. Apparently, OpenAI's bylaws do not set…

> Apparently, OpenAI's bylaws do not set a fixed size for the board and allow the board itself to elect and remove members and allows a simple majority to take any action without even requiring a formal meeting.

For their sake I do hope they read the bylaws and that your 'apparently' doesn't come back to haunt them because then they are in even more trouble.

> The path forward has to include not only all 4 of the current board members resigning but a change in bylaws to establish a larger board with a balance of insiders and outsiders and much clearer operating procedures.

Amen to that. It might even end with the removal of the oversight board and the whole non-profit construct.

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#184

Post by danielmarkbruce »

mjirv wrote: post #56
phpnode wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MS and OpenAI certainly have non-solicitation clauses in their contracts. MS could afford the legal battle but isn't it better for them to wait it out and see what happens first?

Unlikely. Non-poaching agreements are illegal under federal antitrust law.

Nonsense.

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#185

Post by onetimeuse92304 »

righthand wrote: post #65
flappyeagle wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These words are gonna get ate one way or another. There is no outcome where the current board wins. Emmet is already threatening the board with resignation unless they provide evidence of wrongdoing [1]. Which they don't have, because they would have revealed it already. They are empty shirts. [1] https://x.com/emilychangtv/status/1727020834005700914?s=20

Why? The board announced the removal of a CEO which they have the power to do. It upset a bunch of employees who liked the CEO. The board is in search of a new CEO. OpenAI’s valuation isn’t because Sam Altman is worth $90B it’s the tech. The tech is fine. Investors have no reason to worry about their investment in the tech. The people under pressure are Sam Altman trying to reclaim his job he was fired from and Satya…

> OpenAI’s valuation isn’t because Sam Altman is worth $90B it’s the tech.

The IP might be worth something (no idea what kind of patents they hold), but the valuation is fundamentally based on the current products they have and promise of future tech the company can create. And the future value stream far outweighs the current product.

And none of the future product is going to happen without people.

Of course, OpenAI without Sam will hire new people. But if they have already hired the best and they already had worthwhile experience, hiring new people has almost zero chance to recreate their ability to create new products at least in short/medium term.

Finding the right people and hiring them is far more difficult than it is assumed. Dropping money on the problem does not solve more than half of it.

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#186

Post by jacquesm »

phpisthebest wrote: post #116
spamizbad wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think one lesson we learned from Twitter is that you can cull a large amount of a tech workforce and the product will keep humming along, albeit at a reduced rate of change. Also, unlike Twitter, OpenAI pays engineers very competitive salaries and can aggressively re-hire roles.

I dont think there is a large overlap here. Twitter seemed to be adult daycare with a HUGE amount of positions that openly did nothing all day, many many positing publicly about how they only actually worked a few hours a week. Along with a Huge business support staff that seemed to really be pointless I do not see that analog at OpenAI which has mainly engineering positions. Also the idea that you just just "aggress…

There is no comparison between the cadre at Twitter and and the talent pool at OpenAI, I don't think you can replace the bulk of them at all, and nobody worth that kind of compensation is going to touch OpenAI with a 100 foot pole as long as the current board is there.

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#187

Post by 15457345234 »

maxdoop wrote: post #145
15457345234 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So rather than fealty to a person Have you _seen_ the bizarre behaviour that's occurring on twitter? Retweeing heart emojis, making weird declarations of faith, acting in lockstep? They're 100% swearing fealty and it's incredibly weird.

I think it’s wierd the dismissive way many folks in this thread speak about it all. “Sam isn’t important. Employees are weirdos. The board is just fine. Everyone calm down.” That’s more wierd than anything happening on Twitter.

It's objectively weird to see staff - almost all of them researchers and head-down types - unite so firmly behind a non-technical CEO.

Those staff usually have their private champions within the company - usually technically focussed project managers who can run interference against the commercial side - but nod along with the CEO who they view as the ugly necessity of having to have a 'business guy.'

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#188

Post by manquer »

clhodapp wrote: post #52
phpnode wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MS and OpenAI certainly have non-solicitation clauses in their contracts. MS could afford the legal battle but isn't it better for them to wait it out and see what happens first?

Non-solicitation agreements are like super-illegal in California. See the "wage fixing" case against Apple, Google, Adobe, Pixar, Intuit, and Intel.

It is different between JV partners or between vendor and customer . If non solicit agreement were not legal for those , consulting companies either tech or management consulting will not be able to operate at all .

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#189

Post by jacquesm »

phpnode wrote: post #161
jacquesm wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They usually are not.

I'm quite surprised by this, if only because of the regularity with which they appear in standard software consulting agreements.

That depends very much on the locality. What's legal in one country will get you in serious trouble in many others.

hi there!

Re: OpenAI investors keep pushing for Sam Altman’s return

#190

Post by 3cats-in-a-coat »

phpisthebest wrote: post #125
3cats-in-a-coat wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You learned the wrong lesson. Twitter is dying and operating at a significantly degraded level, including moderation, content filtering, ad positioning, which caused a third or fourth mass advertiser exodus just few days ago. Also. Leading the world in revolutionary AI is not exactly like maintaining a pre-existing message app. Twitter: - Had 7500 employees before Musk fired most of them. - Now 1300, of which 550 are…

[flagged]

I've pretty good ways to know that.

- The puffed-up internal valuation of the company (for employee stock options) is $19 billion.

- There's a $15 valuation is by an independent financial services company (Fidelity).

- Elon saved ~$2 billion by firing a lot of his workforce (and closing one datacenter), but also...

- Lost over $3 billion out of $5 billion ad-revenue a year ago.

- And added $1 billion of interest payments (per annum) on a $13 billion loan.

- Twitter was roughly break-even prior.

    5B - 5B + 2B - 3B - 1B = -2B / annum
The monetization (Premium etc.) are not even making up for 1% of that. Do you need the math on that too?

There's nothing controversial in what I'm saying. This is pretty much the actual situation.

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