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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

#691

Post by paulddraper »

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 don't really understanding why the workforce is swinging unambiguously behind Altman.

Lots of reasons, or possible reasons:

1. They think Altman is a skilled and competent leader.

2. They think the board is unskilled and incompetent.

3. They think Altman will provide commercial success to the for-profit as well as fulfilling the non-profit's mission.

4. They disagree or are ambivalent towards the non-profit's mission. (Charters are not immutable.)

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#692

Post by iLoveOncall »

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…

> If they work at OpenAI they are already among the highest lifetime earners on the planet

Isn't the standard package $300K + equity (= nothing if your board is set on making your company non-profit)?

It's nothing to scoff at, but it's hardly top or even average pay for the kind of profiles working there.

It makes perfect sense that they absolutely want the company to be for-profit and listed, that's how they all become millionnaires.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#693

Post by selimthegrim »

lordnacho wrote: post #25
yeck wrote: post #10

> the letter’s signees include Ilya Sutskever _Big sigh_.

For people who appreciate some vintage British comedy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gpc5_3B5xdk The whole thing is just ridiculous. How can you be senior leadership and not have a clear idea of what you want? And what the staff want?

Funny, I would’ve thought this one would have been more appropriate

https://youtu.be/6qpRrIJnswk?si=h37XFUXJDDoy2QZm

Substitute with appropriate ex-Soviet doomer music as necessary

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#694

Post by fatherzine »

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.

This rings true, though I will throw in a bit of nuance. It's not greed, the desire of making as much money as possible, that is the shaping factor. Rather the critical factor is building a product for which people are willing to spend their hard earned money on. Making money is a byproduct of that process, and not making money is a sign that the product, and by extension the process leading to the product, is deficient at some level.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#695

Post by ruszki »

kmlevitt wrote: post #661
Jensson wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Do we know that Ilya even wanted the firing? AFAIK we “know” this only from Altman, who is definitely not a credible source of such information.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#696

Post by leetharris »

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…

IMO it's pretty obvious.

Sam promised to make a lot of people millionaires/billionaires despite OpenAI being a non-profit.

Firing Sam means all these OpenAI people who joined for $1 million comp packages looking for an eventual huge exit now don't get that.

They all want the same thing as the vast majority of people: lots of money.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#697

Post by browningstreet »

m_ke wrote: post #285
breadwinner wrote: post #51

If they join Sam Altman and Greg Brockman at Microsoft they will not need to start from scratch because Microsoft has full rights [1] to ChatGPT IP. They can just fork ChatGPT. Also keep in mind that Microsoft hasn't actually given OpenAI $13 Billion because much of that is in the form of Azure credits. So this could end up being the cheapest acquisition for Microsoft: They get a $90 Billion company for peanuts. [1]…

Watch Satya also save the research arm by making Karpathy or Ilya the head of Microsoft Research

0% chance of Ilya failing upwards from this. He dunked himself hard and has blasted a huge hole in his organizational-game-theory quotient.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#698

Post by therealmocker »

My guess -- Microsoft wasn’t excited about the company structure - the for-profit portion subject to the non-profit mission. Microsoft/Altman structured the deal with OpenAI in a way that cements their access regardless of the non-profit’s wishes. Altman may not have shared those details with the board and they freaked out and fired him. They didn’t disclose to Microsoft ahead of time because they were part of the problem.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#699

Post by dayjah »

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…

Start ups thrive by, in part, creating a sense of camaraderie. Sam isn’t just their boss, he’s their leader, he’s one of them, they believe in him.

You go to bat for your mates, and this is what they’re doing for him.

The sense of togetherness is what allows folks to pull together in stressful times, and it is bred by pulling together in stressful times. IME it’s a core ingredient to success. Since OAI is very successful it’s fair to say the sense of togetherness is very strong. Hence the numbers of folks in the walk out.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#700

Post by jonahrd »

mcny wrote: post #631
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 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…

I'm not sure I fully buy this, only because how would anyone be absolutely certain that they'd make more with Sam Altman in charge? It feels like a weird thing to speculatively rally behind.

I'd imagine there's some internal political drama going on or something we're missing out on.

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