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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

#221

Post by jacquesm »

15457345234 wrote: post #217
ben_w wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, different companies have to follow up with the same offer in order to break up the talent bloc. Otherwise the bloc will move en-masse to one firm. Or just… not hire all of them. Much easier. And in the scenario where Microsoft, Salesforce, NVIDIA, and Meta actually think the OpenAI staff are mad (rather than the more plausible scenario where they think the OpenAI board is mad and are looking for a big pile of…

> Or just… not hire all of them. Much easier. Then a competitor might hire all of them. If you're in the AI business you don't want that. You want to grab either all of them or balkanize them. Come on, this isn't a hard concept to grasp. > And in the scenario where they actually think they're mad ... the script of a Marvel film Then you hire them on a 5 year exclusive contract so they can't rejoin Hydra. > It makes y…

Your position is not internally consistent, you should really think over what each of those implies and then drop or adjust one or more of these.

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

#222

Post by woopsn »

Firing Sam Altman was a truly great move and I hope the board wins out. Investors are furious... Who cares? That's why it is a nonprofit, to protect them from being forced towards maximizing growth and profit at the expense of their mission. Let Sam and whoever wants go to Microsoft and copy the chat product, wishing them the best.

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

#223

Post by ebalit »

15457345234 wrote: post #187
maxdoop wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.'

This is not how I interpret the messages from the OpenAI team members.

They are sending messages of unity, not fealty to Sam Altman.

Working together brought them to the top of the world both in term of research and product. This is a dream come true.

What would surprise me is that they wouldn't do everything they can to avoid breaking their team.

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

#224

Post by righthand »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #101
righthand wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think the board is under any pressure. If they don’t do anything else they just need the employees to fold on their threat to resign. Even if the employees resign, ChatGPT is still running and there are lots of people willing to take the defecting employees spots. The only thing they are pressured on is to fill in the story for the media point of view which is irrelevant to the actual functioning of OpenAI.

Good luck keeping those employees around even if they all decide to fold. These folks are being flooded with offers. Why would they work for an organization that doesn't care what 95% of them want?

Why would I jump ship for some lesser tech when OpenAI has everything I love working on?

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

#225

Post by 15457345234 »

jacquesm wrote: post #221
15457345234 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or just… not hire all of them. Much easier. Then a competitor might hire all of them. If you're in the AI business you don't want that. You want to grab either all of them or balkanize them. Come on, this isn't a hard concept to grasp. > And in the scenario where they actually think they're mad ... the script of a Marvel film Then you hire them on a 5 year exclusive contract so they can't rejoin Hydra. > It makes y…

Your position is not internally consistent, you should really think over what each of those implies and then drop or adjust one or more of these.

> Your position is not internally consistent

I'm throwing out suggestions as to why various differing parties here may be doing what they're doing. There's no need for internal consistency because it's not a unified top-down scenario, it's multipolar game theorizing.

'If A does B, then why would C do D, that isn't consistent' well the answer is that A and C are competing, not cooperating.

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

#226

Post by 15457345234 »

ben_w wrote: post #219
15457345234 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or just… not hire all of them. Much easier. Then a competitor might hire all of them. If you're in the AI business you don't want that. You want to grab either all of them or balkanize them. Come on, this isn't a hard concept to grasp. > And in the scenario where they actually think they're mad ... the script of a Marvel film Then you hire them on a 5 year exclusive contract so they can't rejoin Hydra. > It makes y…

You're saying > Sure, it's in their interest to break up a unified bloc of talent And > If you're in the AI business you don't want that. You want to grab either all of them or balkanize them. And > Nobody wants to invest in a personality cult that's sworn an oath of fealty to one guy, dude. That's basically flushing money down the toilet, as this fiasco demonstrates. These lunatics are ready to sacrifice their child…

Oh, I see what you mean. When I said 'grab all of them' I meant the researchers. On the assumption that you can deprogram them, lol.

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

#227

Post by golergka »

machinekob wrote: post #174
golergka wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I doubt Microsoft will match the hypothetical 90B valuation for their profit share units, otherwise they would’ve left already (Microsoft has agreed to match) If Microsoft won't, Google or Meta will.

Who would buy 500 people for 90B without tech, dataset, company culture they are pretty much your another excellent ML guys or team. They can make great things for sure but not more than your organisation will allow them Im pretty sure this big corporations aren't as fast moving and "we dont care about law/copyright" as ML startups, and people working in Meta/Google are as good as your typical OpenAI guy just with ma…

Matching 90B valuation for compensations would only equal 90B if you assume that 100% of that valuation went to employees. Which sounds pretty far fetched, if you ask me.

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

#228

Post by maxdoop »

righthand wrote: post #181
maxdoop wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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. Th…

No, I think you're mistaking my tone. I was genuinely curious, because it's rare to see someone with a sure view on this mad saga! And I wanted to learn a bit more from the somewhat-less-popular side (I do think there is an odd cultish energy around Sam at the moment from some folks).

I don't know enough about Sam or the board at all, so curious as to reasons why he might be sleazy/sneaky.

The board being quiet, in my opinion, is not doing them any favors!

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

#229

Post by righthand »

josephg wrote: post #168
righthand wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it’s fundamentally about the people, can you name some of these 90% that OpenAI couldn’t live without? Other than Ilya? From where I’m sitting the 90% are replaceable in a flooded market of available software engineers. If Satya and Sam make them happy then go work for Microsoft. The board is calling their bluff right now.

> From where I’m sitting the 90% are replaceable in a flooded market of available software engineers. The market is flooded with junior engineers who have recently graduated from coding boot camps, and who might be good at building the specific types of software they have been shown. However, there is, as I understand it, still a dearth of senior engineers who can do the sort of work that OpenAI engineers are doing:…

It is not flooded with junior engineers, it's engineers of all skill levels. I happen to know as someone who is senior looking for work right now. Most of the open positions are for senior and staff level positions.

Microsoft isn't clambering to hire them, they're clambering for the IP. The OpenAI employees will get significantly less if they go over to Microsoft.

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

#230

Post by smegger001 »

Clubber wrote: post #120
code_runner wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They claimed to remove the CEO with cause. They have not provided cause. Even the twitch dude is asking for the cause. The board just firing off half-cocked and then going silent is probably a larger source the issues for employees than altman the person/leader. There is effectively nobody in the driver seat and the board can't be trusted to do anything in the best interests of the company.

They did provide cause, you just don't accept what they said as valid or detailed enough.

No they made an extremely vague aligation with no concrete examples or evidence provided.
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