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OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

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Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#661

Post by kmlevitt »

Jensson wrote: post #327
tarruda wrote: post #246

The whole thing starts to look like a coup orchestrated by Microsoft

Yeah, this was a fight between the non-profit and the for-profit branches of OpenAI, and the for-profit won. So now the non-profit OpenAI is essentially dead, the takeover is complete.

This view is dated now, because now even Ilya Setskever, The head research scientist who instigated the firing in the first place, now regrets his actions and wants things back to normal! So it really looks like this comes down to the whims of a couple board members now. they don’t seem to have any true believers on their side anymore. It’s just them and almost nobody else.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#662

Post by wenyuanyu »

Emma_Goldman wrote: post #621

I don't really understanding why the workforce is swinging unambiguously behind Altman. The core of the narrative thus far is that the board fired Altman on the grounds that he was prioritising commercialisation over the not-for-profit mission of OpenAI written into the organisation's charter.[1] Given that Sam has since joined Microsoft, that seems plausible, on its face. The board may have been incompetent and shor…

I guess employees are compensated with PPUs. And at the face value before the saga, it could be like 90% or even more of the total value of their packages. How many people are really willing to wipe 90% of their salary out? On the other hand, M$ offers to match. The day employees are compensated with the stock of the for-profit arm, every thing happened after Friday is set.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#663

Post by bbor »

throw__away7391 wrote: post #648
bnralt wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now the cat is out of the bag, and people no longer believe that a non-profit who can act at will is a trusted vehicle for the future. And maybe it’s not. The big mistake people make is hearing non-profit and think it means there’s a greater amount of morality. It’s the same mistake as assuming everyone who is religious is therefore more moral (worth pointing out that religions are nonprofits as well). Most hospita…

I've worked with a lot of non-profits, especially with the upper management. Based on this experience I am mostly convinced that people being motivated by a desire for making money results in far better outcomes/working environment/decision-making than people being motivated by ego, power, and social status, which is basically always what you eventually end up with in any non-profit.

Interesting - in my experience people working in non profits are exactly like those in for-profits. After all, if you’re not the business owner, then EVERY company is a non-profit to you

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#664

Post by NanoYohaneTSU »

nkcmr wrote: post #135

A lot of people here seem to be forgetting [Hanlon's Razor]( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor ) > Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

You seem to forget that Hanlon's Razor isn't a proven concept, in fact the opposite is more likely to be true, given that pesky thing called recorded history.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#666

Post by selimthegrim »

3cats-in-a-coat wrote: post #584
JeremyNT wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no way to read any of this other than that the entire operation is a clown show. All respect to the engineers and their technical abilities, but this organization has demonstrated such a level of dysfunction that there can't be any path back for it. Say MS gets what it wants out of this move, what purpose is there in keeping OpenAI around? Wouldn't they be better off just hiring everybody? Is it just some kin…

Welcome to reality, every operation has clown moments, even the well run ones. That in itself is not critical in mid to long term, but how fast they figure out WTF they want and recover from it. The stakes are gigantic. They may even have AGI cooking inside. My interpretation is relatively basic, and maybe simplistic but here it is: - Ilya had some grievances with Sam Altman's rushing dev and release. And his COI wit…

Murder on the AGI alignment Express

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#667

Post by laurels-marts »

joshstrange wrote: post #308

Well I give up. I think everyone is a "loser" in the current situation. With Ilya signing this I have literally no clue what to believe anymore. I was willing to give the board the benefit of the doubt since I figured non-profit > profit in terms of standing on principal but this timeline is so screwy I'm done. Ilya votes for and stands behind decision to remove Altman, Altman goes to MS, other employees want him bac…

Wait I’m completely confused. Why is Ilya signing this? Is he voting for his own resignation? He’s part of the board. In fact, he was the ringleader of this coup.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#668

Post by [deleted] »

w10-1 wrote: post #660

Hurray for employees seeing the real issue! Hurray also for the reality check on corporate governance. - Any Board can do whatever it has the votes for. - It can dilute anyone's stock, or everyone's. - It can fire anyone for any reason, and give no reasons. Boards are largely disciplined not by actual responsibility to stakeholders or shareholders, but by reputational concerns relative to their continuing and future…

[deleted]

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#669

Post by rawgabbit »

yafbum wrote: post #607
joshstrange wrote: post #308

Well I give up. I think everyone is a "loser" in the current situation. With Ilya signing this I have literally no clue what to believe anymore. I was willing to give the board the benefit of the doubt since I figured non-profit > profit in terms of standing on principal but this timeline is so screwy I'm done. Ilya votes for and stands behind decision to remove Altman, Altman goes to MS, other employees want him bac…

Waiting for US govt to enter the chat. They can't let OpenAI squander world-leading tech and talent; and nationalizing a nonprofit would come with zero shareholders to compensate.

The White House does have an AI Bill of Rights and the recent executive order told the secretaries to draft regulations for AI.

It is a great time to be a lobbyist.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#670

Post by lol768 »

Emma_Goldman wrote: post #659
mcny wrote: post #631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't really understanding why the workforce is swinging unambiguously behind Altman. I have no inside information. I don't know anyone at Open AI. This is all purely speculation. Now that that's out out the way, here is my guess: money. These people never joined OpenAI to "advance sciences and arts" or to "change the world". They joined OpenAI to earn money. They think they can make more money with Sam Altman in…

Really? If they work at OpenAI they are already among the highest lifetime earners on the planet. Favouring moving oneself from the top 0.5% of global lifetime earners to the top 0.1% (or whatever the percentile shift is) over the safe development of a potentially humanity-changing technology would be depraved. EDIT: I don't know why this is being downvoted. My speculation as to the average OpenAI employee's place in…

You only have to look at humanity's history to see that people will make this decision over and over again.
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