Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

581–590 of 1001 posts

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#581

Post by BoorishBears »

minimaxir wrote: post #571
meetpateltech wrote: post #568

Update on the OpenAI drama: Altman and the board had till 5pm to reach a truce where the board would resign and he and Brockman would return. The deadline has passed and mass resignations expected if a deal isn’t reached ASAP https://twitter.com/alexeheath/status/1726055095341875545

Mass resignations from whom, I wonder. Other researchers?

People who joined OpenAI because the organizations they left were stuck self-sabotaging the way OpenAI's board just did (for the same reasons the board did it)

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#582

Post by yallneedtoget »

shrimpx wrote: post #574

Ilya should split off from Altman/Brockman no matter where this lands. I sense an uncrossable chasm between these guys. Anyway I’m with Sutskever, the guy who builds models. Charismatic salesmen are a dime a dozen.

gpt-4 lead resigned with sam

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#583

Post by MBCook »

Zenul_Abidin wrote: post #567

This seems incredibly messed up. Why fire him if you wanted to rehire him in a few hours?

They appear to not have realized how this would be perceived and are now desperately in some kind of damage control mode.

“Ha ha just kidding don’t ruin our stock value!”

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#584

Post by zer0c00ler »

mupuff1234 wrote: post #404
no_wizard wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not for the better why? Obviously Sam wasn’t the best fit for OpenAI and investors aren’t even saying what the problem is. Clearly the board feels he was the wrong person for the job. I think it’s ridiculous that everything thinks that Sam being outed means OpenAI is in trouble. Let this play out and see how it evolves

It's not only Sam, also Greg and a few other engineers have already resigned (and one can assume more to follow)

Three engineers isn’t a lot honestly after such a stunt. I’d assumed there would more loyal folks, but maybe most are really in for the mission.

The next couple of weeks will tell.

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#586

Post by cedws »

shrimpx wrote: post #574

Ilya should split off from Altman/Brockman no matter where this lands. I sense an uncrossable chasm between these guys. Anyway I’m with Sutskever, the guy who builds models. Charismatic salesmen are a dime a dozen.

Charismatic salesmen get the money needed to build the models. Computer scientists are a dime a dozen, universities churn them out every year.

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#587

Post by sumedh »

gkoberger wrote: post #90
mycologos wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think they could have won in the court of public opinion ... [but] they tried to skewer him, and it backfired completely Maybe we have different definitions of "the court of public opinion". Most people don't know who Sam Altman is, and most of the people who do know don't have strong opinions on his performance as OpenAI's CEO. Even on HN, the reaction to the board "skwer[ing] him" has been pretty mixed, and mos…

I mean, they're (allegedly) trying to get him to come back 24 hours later... so it's safe to say it did indeed backfire completely. Sure, the average person doesn't care about Sam. But among the people who matter, Sam certainly came out on top.

> I mean, they're (allegedly) trying to get him to come back 24 hours later.

Could be a rumour spread by people close to Sam though.

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#588

Post by leoh »

yosito wrote: post #570
crop_rotation wrote: post #60

The board seems truly incompetent here and looking at the member list it doesn't seem very surprising. A competent board should have asked for legal and professional advice before taking a drastic step like this. Instead the board thought it was a boxing match and tried to deliver a knockout punch before the market closes with blunt language. This might be the most incompetent board for an organisation of this size.

Maybe they asked ChatGPT for legal advice.

Better yet, Sutskever’s version with AGI!

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#589

Post by leoh »

adharmad wrote: post #361
crop_rotation wrote: post #60

The board seems truly incompetent here and looking at the member list it doesn't seem very surprising. A competent board should have asked for legal and professional advice before taking a drastic step like this. Instead the board thought it was a boxing match and tried to deliver a knockout punch before the market closes with blunt language. This might be the most incompetent board for an organisation of this size.

It was complete amateur hour for the board. But that aside, how did so many clueless folks who understand neither the technology, or the legalese, nor have enough intelligence/acumen to forsee the immediate impact of their actions happen to be on the board of one of the most important tech companies?

Not many and even fewer if you consider folks that have a good grasp of themselves, their psychology, their emotions — and how they can mislead them, and their heart.

IME most folks at Anthropic, OpenAI or whatever that are freaking out about things never defined the problem well and typically were engaging with highly theoretical models as opposed to the real capabilities of a well-defined, accomplished (or clearly accomplishable) system. It was too triggering for me to consider roles there in the past given that these were typically the folks I knew working there.

Sam may have added a lot of groundedness, but idk ofc bc I wasn’t there.

Re: OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO

#590

Post by medler »

meetpateltech wrote: post #568

Update on the OpenAI drama: Altman and the board had till 5pm to reach a truce where the board would resign and he and Brockman would return. The deadline has passed and mass resignations expected if a deal isn’t reached ASAP https://twitter.com/alexeheath/status/1726055095341875545

Really weird phrasing in this tweet. The idea is that Altman and/or a bunch of employees were demanding the board reinstate Altman and then resign. And they’re calling it a “truce.” Oh, and there’s a deadline (5 pm), but since it’s already passed the board merely has to “reach” this “truce” “ASAP.”

Edit: an update to the verge article sheds some more light, but I still consider it very sus since it’s coming from the Altman camp and seems engineered to exert maximal pressure on the board. And the supposed deadline has passed and we haven’t heard any resignations announced

> Update, 5:35PM PT: A source close to Altman says the board had agreed in principle to resign and to allow Altman and Brockman to return, but has since waffled — missing a key 5PM PT deadline by which many OpenAI staffers were set to resign. If Altman decides to leave and start a new company, those staffers would assuredly go with him.

Post reply on HN