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Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

arstechnica.com

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Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#341

Post by cthalupa »

tuxguy wrote: post #66
Waterluvian wrote: post #29

How important is Altman? How important were three senior scientists? Can they start their own company, raise funding, and overtake OpenAI in a few years? Or does OpenAI have some material advantage that isn’t likely to be harmed by this? Perhaps the competition is inevitably a good thing. Or maybe a bad thing if it creates pressure to cut ethical corners. I also wonder if the dream of an “open” org bringing this tech…

An optimistic perspective of how despite today's regrettable events, Sama and gdb will start something new and more competition is a good thing : https://x.com/DrJimFan/status/1725916938281627666?s=20 I have a contrarian prediction : Due to pressure from investors and a lawsuit against the openai board, the board will be made to resign and Sama & Greg will return to openai. Anybody else agree ?

> I have a contrarian prediction : Due to pressure from investors and a lawsuit against the openai board, the board will be made to resign and Sama & Greg will return to openai.

The board is not beholden to any investors. The board is for the non-profit that does not have shareholders, and it fully owns and controls the manager entity that controls the for-profit. The LLC's operating agreement is explicit that it is beholden to the charter and mission of the non-profit, not creating financial gain for the shareholders of the for-profit company.

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#342

Post by doubled112 »

galangalalgol wrote: post #332
dragonwriter wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> split the company into two camps The split existed long prior to the board action, and extended up into the board itself. If anything, the board action is a turning point toward decisively ending the split and achieving unity of purpose.

Can someone explain the sides? Ilya seems to think transformers could make AGI and they need to be careful? Sam said what? "We need to make better LLMs to make more money."? My general thought is that whatever architecture gets you to AGI, you don't prevent it from killing everyone by chaining it better, you prevent that by training it better, and then treating it like someone with intrinsic value. As opposed to lock…

> locking it in a room with 4chan.

Didn’t Microsoft already try this experiment a few years back with an AI chatbot?

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#343

Post by pdntspa »

torstenvl wrote: post #272

It isn't a coup. A coup is when power is taken and taken by force, not when your constituents decide you no longer represent their interests well. That's like describing voting out a politician as a coup. Calling it a coup falsely implies that OpenAI in some sense belongs to Sam Altman. If anything is a coup, it's the idea that a founder can incorporate a company and sell parts of it off, and nevertheless still own i…

> voting out a politician as a coup.

That6 is literally a political coup

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#344

Post by ketzo »

CPLX wrote: post #163
ketzo wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do have investors in the for-profit subsidiary, including Microsoft and the employees. Check out the diagram in the linked article.

That’s right. Which isn’t the company that just fired Sam Altman.

I take your point, but still, I don’t think it’s correct to imply that investors in the for-profit company have no sway or influence over the future of OpenAI.

I sure as shit wouldn’t wanna be on Microsoft’s bad side, regardless of my tax status.

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#346

Post by croes »

somebodythere wrote: post #233
croes wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And then? Training data is more restricted now, hardware is hard to get, fine tuning needs time.

First two problems are easily solved with money

Money doesn't magically create hardware, it takes time to produce it

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#347

Post by danenania »

Michelangelo11 wrote: post #240

I've seen some discussion on HN in which people claimed that even really important engineers aren't -too- important and that Ilya is actually replaceable, using Apple's growth after Woz' departure as an example. But I don't think that's the best situation to compare this to. I think a much better one is John Carmack firing Romero from id Software after the release of Quake. Some background: During a period of about 1…

A difference in this case is how capital intensive AI research is at the level OpenAI is operating. Someone who can keep the capital rolling in (whether through revenue, investors, or partners) and get access to GPUs and proprietary datasets is essential.

Carmack could make graphics advances on his own with just a computer and his brain. Ilya needs a lot more for OpenAI to keep advancing. His giant brain isn’t enough by itself.

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#348

Post by mindcrime »

doubled112 wrote: post #342
galangalalgol wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can someone explain the sides? Ilya seems to think transformers could make AGI and they need to be careful? Sam said what? "We need to make better LLMs to make more money."? My general thought is that whatever architecture gets you to AGI, you don't prevent it from killing everyone by chaining it better, you prevent that by training it better, and then treating it like someone with intrinsic value. As opposed to lock…

> locking it in a room with 4chan. Didn’t Microsoft already try this experiment a few years back with an AI chatbot?

> Didn’t Microsoft already try this experiment a few years back with an AI chatbot?

You may be thinking of Tay?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tay_(chatbot)

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#349

Post by doubled112 »

mindcrime wrote: post #348
doubled112 wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> locking it in a room with 4chan. Didn’t Microsoft already try this experiment a few years back with an AI chatbot?

> Didn’t Microsoft already try this experiment a few years back with an AI chatbot? You may be thinking of Tay? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tay_(chatbot)

That’s the one.

Re: Details emerge of surprise board coup that ousted CEO Sam Altman at OpenAI

#350

Post by username332211 »

torstenvl wrote: post #272

It isn't a coup. A coup is when power is taken and taken by force, not when your constituents decide you no longer represent their interests well. That's like describing voting out a politician as a coup. Calling it a coup falsely implies that OpenAI in some sense belongs to Sam Altman. If anything is a coup, it's the idea that a founder can incorporate a company and sell parts of it off, and nevertheless still own i…

It's not uncommon to describe the fall of a government as a "parliamentary" coup, if the relevant proceedings of a legislative assembly are characterized by haste and intrigue, rather than debate and deliberation.

For example, the French revolution saw 3 such events commonly descried as coups - the the fall of Robespierre on 9-th of Thermidor and the Directory's (technically legal) annulment of elections on the 18-th of Fructidor and 22-nd Floréal. The last one was even somewhat bloodless.

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