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Evolving OpenAI's Structure

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191–200 of 746 posts

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#191

Post by sanderjd »

cshimmin wrote: post #155
no_wizard wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook had immense network effects working for it back then. What network effect does OpenAI have? Far as I can tell, moving from OpenAI to Gemini or something else is easy. It’s not sticky at all. There’s no “my friends are primarily using OpenAI so I am too” or anything like that. So again, I ask, what makes it sticky?

Yep, I mostly interact with these AIs through Cursor. When I want to ask it a question, there's a little dropdown box and I can select openai/anthropic/deepseek whatever model. It's as easy as that to switch.

Yeah but I remember when search first started getting integrated with the browser and the "switch search engine" thing was significantly more prominent. Then Google became the default and nobody ever switched it and the rest is history.

So the interesting question is: How did that happen? Why wasn't Google search an easily swapped commodity? Or if it was, how did they win and defend their default status? Why didn't the existing juggernauts at the time (Microsoft) beat them at this game?

I have my own answers for these, and I'm sure all the smart people figuring out strategy at Open AI have thought about similar things.

It's not clear if Open AI will be able to overcome this commodification issue (personally, I think they won't), but I don't think it's impossible, and there is prior art for at least some of the pages in this playbook.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#192

Post by sp527 »

jstummbillig wrote: post #156
jjani wrote: post #107

SamA is in a hurry because he's set to lose the race. We're at peak valuation and he needs to convert something now . If the entrenched giants (Google, Microsoft and Apple) catch up - and Google 100% has, if not surpassed - they have a thousand levers to pull and OpenAI is done for. Microsoft has realized this, hence why they're breaking up with them - Google and Anthropic have shown they don't need OpenAI. Galaxy ph…

[flagged]

Literally the founder of Y Combinator all but outright called Sam Altman a conniving dickbag. That’s the consensus view advanced by the very man who made him.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#193

Post by jwilber »

blibble wrote: post #69
the_duke wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AGI is matter of when, not if. It will likely require research breakthroughs, significant hardware advancement, and anything from a few years to a few decades. But it's coming. ChatGPT was released 2.5 years ago, and look at all the crazy progress that has been made in that time. That doesn't mean that the progress has to continue, we'll probably see a stall. But AIs that are on a level with humans for many common ta…

> AGI is matter of when, not if. LLMs destroying any sort of capacity (and incentive) for the population to think pushes this further and further out each day

I agree that LLMs are hurting the general population’s capacity to think (assuming they use it often. I’ve certainly noticed a slight trend among students I’ve taught to use less effort, and myself to some extent).

I don’t agree that this will affect ML progress much, since the general population isn’t contributing to core ML research.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#195

Post by jjani »

rileyphone wrote: post #170
no_wizard wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook had immense network effects working for it back then. What network effect does OpenAI have? Far as I can tell, moving from OpenAI to Gemini or something else is easy. It’s not sticky at all. There’s no “my friends are primarily using OpenAI so I am too” or anything like that. So again, I ask, what makes it sticky?

From talking to people, the average user relies on memories and chat history, which is not easy to migrate. I imagine that's the part of the strategy to keep people from hopping model providers.

Google, MS, Apple and Meta are all quite capable of generating such a history for new users, if they'd like to.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#196

Post by nativeit »

wmf wrote: post #160
elAhmo wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have seen how much power does the board have after the firing of Altman - none. Let's see how this plays out. PBC effectively means nothing - just take a look at Xai and its purchase of Twitter. I would love to listen reasoning explaining why this ~33 billion USD move is benefiting public.

ChatGPT is free. That's the public benefit.

Define “free”.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#197

Post by jampa »

nfRfqX5n wrote: post #143
jjani wrote: post #107

SamA is in a hurry because he's set to lose the race. We're at peak valuation and he needs to convert something now . If the entrenched giants (Google, Microsoft and Apple) catch up - and Google 100% has, if not surpassed - they have a thousand levers to pull and OpenAI is done for. Microsoft has realized this, hence why they're breaking up with them - Google and Anthropic have shown they don't need OpenAI. Galaxy ph…

ask 10 people on the street about chatgpt or gemini and see which one they know

The real money is for enterprise use (via APIs), so public perception is not as crucial as for a consumer product.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#198

Post by atleastoptimal »

pants2 wrote: post #21

It's somewhat odd to me that many companies operating in the public eye are basically stating "We are creating a digital god, an instrument more powerful than any nuclear weapon" and raising billions to do it, and nobody bats an eye...

Because many people fundamentally don’t believe AGI is possible at a basic level, even AI researchers. Humans tend to only understand what materially affects their existence.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#199

Post by sanderjd »

sneak wrote: post #100
drewbeck wrote: post #82

I see OpenAI's original form as the last gasp of a kind of liberal tech; in a world where "doing good" was seen as very important, the non-profit approach made sense and got a lot of people on board. These days the Altmans and the pmarcas of the world are much more comfortable expressing their authoritarian, self-centered world views; the "evolving" structure of Open AI is fully in line with that. They want to be the…

Is it reasonable to assign the descriptor “authoritarian” to anyone who simply does not subscribe to the common orthodoxy of one faction in the american culture war? That is what it seems to me is happening here, though I would love to be wrong. I have not seen anything from sama or pmarca that I would classify as “authoritarian”.

No, "authoritarian" is a word with a specific meaning. I'm not sure about applying it to Sam Altman, but Marc Andreessen has expressed views that I consider authoritarian in his victory lap tour since last year's presidential election.

Re: Evolving OpenAI's Structure

#200

Post by [deleted] »

jjani wrote: post #107

SamA is in a hurry because he's set to lose the race. We're at peak valuation and he needs to convert something now . If the entrenched giants (Google, Microsoft and Apple) catch up - and Google 100% has, if not surpassed - they have a thousand levers to pull and OpenAI is done for. Microsoft has realized this, hence why they're breaking up with them - Google and Anthropic have shown they don't need OpenAI. Galaxy ph…

[deleted]
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