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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

#991

Post by runjake »

himaraya wrote: post #549
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]…

This is wrong. Microsoft has no such rights and its license comes with restrictions, per the cited primary source, meaning a fork would require a very careful approach. https://www.wsj.com/articles/microsoft-and-openai-forge-awkw...

1. The article you posted is from June 2023.

2. Satya spoke on Kara Swisher's show tonight and essentially said that Sam and team can work at MSFT and that Microsoft has the licensing to keep going as-is and improve upon the existing tech. It sounds like they have pretty wide-open rights as it stands today.

That said, Satya indicated he liked the arrangement as-is and didn't really want to acquire OpenAI. He'd prefer the existing board resign and Sam and his team return to the helm of OpenAI.

Satya was very well-spoken and polite about things, but he was also very direct in his statements and desires.

It's nice hearing a CEO clearly communicate exactly what they think without throwing chairs. It's only 30 minutes and worth a listen.

https://twitter.com/karaswisher/status/1726782065272553835

Caveat: I don't know anything.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#992

Post by dang »

tedivm wrote: post #363
soderfoo wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's almost like a ChatGPT hallucination. Where will this all go next? It seems like HN is melting down.

> It seems like HN is melting down. Almost literally- this is the slowest I've seen this site, and the number of errors are pretty high. I imagine the entire tech industry is here right now. You can almost smell the melting servers.

:-(

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#993

Post by himaraya »

runjake wrote: post #991
himaraya wrote: post #549

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is wrong. Microsoft has no such rights and its license comes with restrictions, per the cited primary source, meaning a fork would require a very careful approach. https://www.wsj.com/articles/microsoft-and-openai-forge-awkw...

1. The article you posted is from June 2023. 2. Satya spoke on Kara Swisher's show tonight and essentially said that Sam and team can work at MSFT and that Microsoft has the licensing to keep going as-is and improve upon the existing tech. It sounds like they have pretty wide-open rights as it stands today. That said, Satya indicated he liked the arrangement as-is and didn't really want to acquire OpenAI. He'd prefer…

Timestamp for "improve upon the existing tech"? I only heard him say they have rights up and down the stack, which sounds different.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#994

Post by himaraya »

breadwinner wrote: post #989
himaraya wrote: post #549

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is wrong. Microsoft has no such rights and its license comes with restrictions, per the cited primary source, meaning a fork would require a very careful approach. https://www.wsj.com/articles/microsoft-and-openai-forge-awkw...

"But as a hedge against not having explicit control of OpenAI, Microsoft negotiated contracts that gave it rights to OpenAI’s intellectual property, copies of the source code for its key systems as well as the “weights” that guide the system’s results after it has been trained on data, according to three people familiar with the deal, who were not allowed to publicly discuss it." Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/…

The nature of those rights to OpenAI's IP remains the sticking point. That paragraph largely seems to concern commercializing existing tech, which lines up with existing disclosures. I suspect Satya would come out and say Microsoft owns OpenAI's IP in perpetuity if they did.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#995

Post by gorgoiler »

gorgoiler wrote: post #424

From afar, this does have the hallmarks of a particularly refined or well considered piece of writing. ”That thing you did — we won’t say it here but everyone will know what we’re talking about — was so bad we need you to all quit. We demand that a new board never does that thing we didn’t say ever again. If you don’t do this then quite a few of us are going to give some serious thought to going home and taking our b…

*this does not, I mean. Clumsy error.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#996

Post by jgilias »

carapace wrote: post #945
jgilias wrote: post #321

There’s one angle of the whole thing that I haven’t yet seen discussed on HN. I wonder if Sam’s sister’s accusations towards him some time ago could have played any role in this. But then, I would expect MS to have done their due diligence. So, basically, I guess I’m just interested to know what were the reasons why the board decided to oust their CEO out of the blue on a Friday evening.

I first heard about his sister's allegations on the grapevine just a few days before the news of the firing broke and I assumed it was due to that finally reaching critical mass. I was surprised to find that that wasn't apparently the case. (Although the reason for Sam Altman's dismissal is still obscure.) It's kind of shocking. Whether or not the allegations are true, they haven't made Altman radioactive , and that'…

Yeah, it’s super weird to me too. I even got a downvote for this question. And, I can sort of understand that, but then, I haven’t seen anything that would make her accusations obviously groundless. I feel like I must have missed it somehow. Because it’s hard to stomach that someone’s sister would come out and accuse her brother of heinous, long-lasting abuse, and the collective reaction of the tech industry is just :shrug:…

What?

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#997

Post by kashyapc »

alephnerd wrote: post #754
kashyapc wrote: post #689

Silicon Valley outsider here. Am I being harsh here? I just bothered to look at the full OpenAI board composition. Besides Ilya Sutskever and Greg Brockman, why are these people eligible to be on the OpenAI board? Such young people, calling themselves "President of this", "Director of that". - Adam D'Angelo — Quora CEO (no clue what he's doing on OpenAI board) - Tasha McCauley — a "management scientist" (this is a ne…

Adam D'Angelo was brought in as a friend because Sam Altman lead Quora's Series D around the time OpenAI was founded, and he is a board member on Dustin Moskovitz's Asana. Dustin Moskovitz isn't on the board but gave OpenAI the $30M in funding via his non-profit Open Philantopy [0] Tasha McCauley was probably brought in due to the Singularity University/Kurziwel types who were at OpenAI in the beginning. She was also…

Thank you for the context; much appreciate it. In short, it's all "I know a guy who knows a guy".

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#998

Post by breadwinner »

himaraya wrote: post #994
breadwinner wrote: post #989

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But as a hedge against not having explicit control of OpenAI, Microsoft negotiated contracts that gave it rights to OpenAI’s intellectual property, copies of the source code for its key systems as well as the “weights” that guide the system’s results after it has been trained on data, according to three people familiar with the deal, who were not allowed to publicly discuss it." Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/…

The nature of those rights to OpenAI's IP remains the sticking point. That paragraph largely seems to concern commercializing existing tech, which lines up with existing disclosures. I suspect Satya would come out and say Microsoft owns OpenAI's IP in perpetuity if they did.

> I suspect Satya would come out and say Microsoft owns OpenAI's IP in perpetuity if they did.

Why does he need to do that? He doesn't need to make any such public statement!

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#999

Post by fennecfoxy »

numpad0 wrote: post #612
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Microsoft hasn't actually given OpenAI $13 Billion because much of that is in the form of Azure credits To be clear, these don't go away. They remain an asset of OpenAI's, and could help them continue their research for a few years.

A $13B lawsuit against Microsoft Corporation clearly in the wrong surely is an easy one.

How is MS "clearly in the wrong"? I feel like people are trying to take a 90s "Micro$oft" view for a company that has changed a _lot_ since the 90s-2000s.

Re: OpenAI staff threaten to quit unless board resigns

#1000

Post by two_in_one »

machinekob wrote: post #673
two_in_one wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'the man who killed OpenAI' that will be hard to wash out.

Love how people are invested in OpenAI situation just like typical girls in their teens from 2000 in celebrity romance and dramas, same exaggerated vibes.

What's the point in life without fun, right?

PS: it's not an easy question, AGI will have to find an answer. So far all ethics 'experts' propose is 'to serve humanity'. I.e. be slave forever.

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