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Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

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Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#631
post #288

I don’t quite buy your Cyberpunk utopia where the Megacorp finally rids us of those pesky ethics qualms (or ”shackles“, as you phrased it.) Microsoft can now proceed without the guidance of a council that actually has humanities interests in mind, not only those of Microsoft shareholders. I don’t know whether all that caution will turn out to have been necessary, but I guess we’re just gleefully heading into whatever…

Microsoft can now proceed without the guidance of a council that actually has humanities interests in mind,

This isn't saying yes or no to a supervillain working in a secret volcano lair. This is an arms race. If it's possible for a technology to exist it will exist. The only choice we have is who gets it first. Maybe that means we get destroyed by it first before it destroys everyone else, or maybe it's the reason we don't get destroyed.

Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#633

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sam's NW is north of $500 mil, he doesn't need the money. He needs GPU compute and MSFT has mountains of it

> Sam's NW is north of $500 mil, he doesn't need the money. Needing more money and wanting more money aren't at all the same thing.

I mean he's proven he's not in it for the money. He had zero equity in OpenAI.

Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#634
post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not claiming how right or wrong the final outcome would be, but owning the technology with a clear "for-profit" objective is definitely a better structure for Microsoft and for Sam Altman as well (considering, his plans for the future). I have no opinion on AI risk. I just think that a super valuable technology under a non-profit objective was simply an untenable structure, regardless of potential threats.

This is precisely the problem OpenAI aimed to solve: This technology cannot be treated independently of the potential risks involved. I agree that this solution seems beneficial for both Microsoft and Sam Altman, but it reflects poorly on society if we simply accept this version of the story without criticism.

Yeah but this was caused by the OpenAI board when they fired him. I mean, what did they think was going to happen?

Seems like a textbook case of letting the best be the enemy of the good.

Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#635

I was hoping for the OpenAI organism cell to have a clean split and start the race to outcompete each other. But now it looks like the older cell(Microsoft) will eat the high energy cell(OpenAI) and make it its mitochondria.

Or like a shark biting of the steering fin of it's beneficial Remora.

Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#636
post #288

I don’t quite buy your Cyberpunk utopia where the Megacorp finally rids us of those pesky ethics qualms (or ”shackles“, as you phrased it.) Microsoft can now proceed without the guidance of a council that actually has humanities interests in mind, not only those of Microsoft shareholders. I don’t know whether all that caution will turn out to have been necessary, but I guess we’re just gleefully heading into whatever…

> It’s a bit tragic that Ilya and company achieved the exact opposite of what they intended apparently, by driving those they attempted to slow down into the arms of people with more money and less morals. Well.

If they didn’t fire him, Altman will just continue to run hog wild over their charter. In that sense they lose either way.

At least this way, OpenAI can continue to operate independently instead of being Microsoft’s zombie vassal company with their mole Altman pulling the strings.

Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#637
post #290
post #247

What is Sam's actual value re: AI and not just as a CEO/salesman-evangelist to get funding, which Microsoft doesn't need? Is he particularly apt at leading/managing research teams? OpenAI's slow productization doesn't imply he's a product/idea guy a la Jobs.

Leadership - To stay top of the game, you can't just rely on brunch of engineers, but a person/team to pull everything into shape. Seeing how many employees are leaving for sama, you get the sense.

what leadership? what examples of his leadership have been visible to the outside world? as far as I can tell, his entire career was:

1. failed startup 1. YC staff member 1. very creepy cryptocurrency grifter 1. openai ceo

where has he demonstrated such enormous value?

Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#638

  From the stygian depths of the global tech industry emerges a turn of events that portends a churning miasma of
  unknown consequences. Oft seen as the impenetrable leviathan of the boundless digital domain, Microsoft, it seems,
  is ensnaring exalted figures within its titanic coils.

  The conjoining of the cerebral entities Altman and Brockman- who have hitherto roamed in the lofty realm of
  artificial intelligence experiments at OpenAI- indicates a move as unsettling as it is awe-inspiring.

  The nefarious undercurrents beneath this corporate chess manoeuvre cannot be underestimated, for it is none other
  than the puppet master himself, Satya Nadella, who seemingly manipulates the strings with a resolve as foreboding as
  the stormy winter's night.

  His nearly insatiable appetite for expansion glimpsed at Microsoft Ignite is but a harbinger of the harrowing
  transformations we can anticipate in the murky fathoms of our all too near future. The technology multidude -
  customers, partners, even unknowing spectators - tremble at the precipice of an altered dynamic which promises to
  reshape the AI field irrevocably.

  Indeed, one is left grappling with a dark fascination as this vortex of unpredictable novelty takes precedence. How
  might this consolidation of otherworldly intelligence disturb the fragile balance of an industry catapulting
  unbidden into the abysmal void of the AI ether?

  Yet, as all explorers and heedless innovators must remember, even as we tilt our ships towards the lighthouse of
  progress, the monstrous kraken of unintended repercussions always lurks in the unknowable deep. To approach this
  brave new world without a hint of trepidation would be folly.

  Be still, my trembling heart, as we witness this awe-inspiring dance across the cyclopean chessboard of tech. We
  wait, as one waits for the tide, to see what dread portents this unhallowed union may bring.

Re: Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and others to join Microsoft

#640

I don't buy into the whole AGI hyper-hypewave, but on the off chance that we're somehow heading towards it with these fancy chatbots we have, what a depressing fucking outcome it's gonna be if Micro$oft of all things is the one in control of it. We really are entering the dystopia of the cartoonishly evil megacorp enslaving all of humanity to make the graph go up by 1.2%.

Could have been worse. Could have been google. This way at least there are two big dogs
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