A real power struggle! How exciting. It goes to show that no matter the structure, when it comes down to it the investors always have the last say.
OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
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Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#432I am not sure it really makes sense for the investors to continue with OpenAI. It seems like this incident proved that the constitution of the company wasn't really compatible with a profit focus. It was a split from the beginning, and obviously a questionable arrangement. It just came to a head to make it obvious. The business and investment people want to make money. Many of the researchers want to take their time…
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#433Earlier quoted context omitted.
They are already the dumbest board in history (even dumber than Apple’s board firing Steve Jobs). So it’s not out of keeping with anything. Besides, those 2 independent board members (who couldn’t do fizz-buzz if their lives depended on it) won’t be staying long if Sam returns— nor are they likely to ever serve on any board ever again after their shenanigans.
Some of the board member choices are baffling. Like why is Joseph Gordon Levitt’s wife on the board? Her startup has under 10 employees and has a personal email address as the contact address on the homepage.
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#434Man, the board already looked reckless and incompetent, but this solidifies the appearance. You can do crazy ill-advised things, but if you unwaveringly commit, we’ll always wonder if you’re secretly a genius. But when you immediately backtrack, we’ll know you were a fool all along.
Dude, everyone already thinks the board did a crazy ill-advised thing. They're about to be the board of like a 5 person or so company if they double down and commit. To be honest I hate takes like yours, where people think that acknowledging a mistake (even a giant mistake) is a sign of weakness. A bigger sign of weakness in my opinion is people who commit to a shitty idea just because they said it first, despite all…
At this point, I don’t care how it resolves—the people who made that decision should be removed for sheer incompetence.
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#435Reinstate Sam and now the rest have to go.
For those downvoting me, I’d be interested to hear how you think it could work for him to come back and work with the people that unceremoniously fired him and made it sound like he had ethical violations when it now seems clear it was a disagreement over strategy. If there is a disagreement over strategy and he goes back what value do the others provide now? Also, wouldn’t it seem clear that the board acted rashly i…
From my own experience, short assertive comments tend to get downvoted on HN. Unlike reddit, votes here are less about agree/disagree.
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#436He was outed for a reason. Why in the world would the board backtrack this? I think this is rumor mill reporting, trying to get things out too fast.
I've yet to see a good one. And even if: how you do something is often as important or even more important than that you do something. And on the 'how' bit the board just utterly failed. This is the most watched company in the world right now on the tech front, you can't just oust the CEO without a very good plan. If you do that kind of thing on a whim you are not fit to serve on the board of any company, but especially not on the board of this one.
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#437Man, the board already looked reckless and incompetent, but this solidifies the appearance. You can do crazy ill-advised things, but if you unwaveringly commit, we’ll always wonder if you’re secretly a genius. But when you immediately backtrack, we’ll know you were a fool all along.
Dude, everyone already thinks the board did a crazy ill-advised thing. They're about to be the board of like a 5 person or so company if they double down and commit. To be honest I hate takes like yours, where people think that acknowledging a mistake (even a giant mistake) is a sign of weakness. A bigger sign of weakness in my opinion is people who commit to a shitty idea just because they said it first, despite all…
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#438And it looks like now they might be very close to the limits of their own capability. I'm not sure how much more they can give.
On the surface, their new features always seem to be quite exciting. But when the dust settles it is again all very lackluster, often copied from open source ideas. Not something you can bet on.
Their biggest moats are their popularity, marketing, and their large bags of cash. The latter of which they are burning through extremely quickly. The thing is, it's easy to build something massive when you don't care about unit economics. But where do they end up when the competitive forces commoditize this?
When listening to interviews with Sam I was always surprised by how little useful information I am able to get out of listening to him. I'm sure he's very smart but he tries to project the aura of radical honesty while simultaneously trying to keep all of his cards extremely close to his chest. All that without the product chops to actually back it up. That's my read.
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#439Reinstate Sam and now the rest have to go.
Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO
#440Are you fucking kidding me? OK. OK. I’ve said this my whole career. Engineers are the most emotional specie of worker. There is a grand delusion that engineers are rational. This just goes to show how irrational they are. Snap reactions like this: sign of a brilliant but fucked up engineer. I am an engineer. I am under no illusion that I’m rational. Quite the opposite.
> Don’t piss off an irreplaceable engineer or they’ll fire you. not taking any sides here.
One scientist's power trip (Ilya is not an engineer) triggers the power fantasy of the extremely online.