All: this madness makes our server strain too. Sorry! Nobody will be happier than I when this bottleneck (edit: the one in our code—not the world) is a thing of the past.
I've turned down the page size so everyone can see the threads, but you'll have to click through the More links at the bottom of the page to read all the comments, or like this:
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.
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 back or want to join him at MS and Ilya is one of them, just madness.
There can exist an inherent delusion within elements of a company, that if left unchallenged, can persist. An agreement for instance, can seem airtight because it's never challenged, but falls apart in court. The OpenAI fallacy was that non-profit principals were guiding the success of the firm, and when the board decided to test that theory, it broke the whole delusion. Had it not fully challenged Altman, the board could've kept the delusion intact long enough to potentially pressure Altman to limit his side-projects or be less profit minded, since Altman would have an interest to keep the delusion intact as well. 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.
This was handled so very, very poorly. Frankly it's looking like Microsoft is going to come out of this better than anyone, especially if they end up getting almost 500 new AI staff out of it (staff that already function well as a team).
> In their letter, the OpenAI staff threaten to join Altman at Microsoft. “Microsoft has assured us that there are positions for all OpenAI employees at this new subsidiary should we choose to join," they write.
> Microsoft is going to come out of this better than anyone
Exactly. I'm curious about how much of this was planned vs emergent. I doubt it was all planned: it would take an extraordinary mind to foresee all the possible twists.
Equally, it's not entirely unpredictable. MS is the easiest to read: their moves to date have been really clear in wanting to be the primary commercial beneficiary of OAI's work.
OAI itself is less transpararent from the outside. There's a tension between the "humanity first" mantra that drove its inception, and the increasingly "commercial exploitation first" line that Altman was evidently driving.
As things stand, the outcome is pretty clear: if the choice was between humanity and commercial gain, the latter appears to have won.
In hindsight firing Sam was a self-destructing gamble by the OpenAI board. Initially it seemed Sam may have committed some inexcusable financial crime but doesn't look so anymore.
Irony is that if a significant portion of OpenAI staff opt to join Microsoft, then Microsoft essentially killed their own $13B investment in OpenAI earlier this year. Better than acquiring for $80B+ I suppose.
> Frankly it's looking like Microsoft is going to come out of this better than anyone
Sounds like that's what someone wants and is trying to obfuscate what's going on behind the scenes.
If Windows 11 shows us anything about Microsoft's monopolistic behavior, having them be the ring of power for LMM's makes the future of humanity look very bleak.
> it's looking like Microsoft is going to come out of this better than anyon
Didn't follow this closely, but isn't that implicitly what an ex-CEO could have possibly been accused off ie. not acting in the company's best interest but someone else's? Not unprecedented either eg. the case of Nokia/Elop.
That's because they're the only adult in the room and mature company with mature management. Boring, I know. But sometimes experience actually pays off.
We’re seeing our generation’s “traitorous eight” story play out [1]. If this creates a sea of AI start-ups, competing and exploring different approaches, it could be invigorating on many levels.
If I weren't so adverse to conspiracy theories, I would think that this is all a big "coup" by Microsoft: Ilya conspired with Microsoft and Altman to get him fired by the board, just to make it easy for Microsoft to hire him back without fear of retaliation, along with all the engineers that would join him in the process.
Then, Ilya would apologize publicly for "making a huge mistake" and, after some period, would join Microsoft as well, effectively robbing OpenAI from everything of value. The motive? Unlocking the full financial potential of ChatGPT, which was until then locked down by the non-profit nature of its owner.
Of course, in this context, the $10 billion deal between Microsoft and OpenAI is part of the scheme, especially the part where Microsoft has full rights over ChatGPT IP, so that they can just fork the whole codebase and take it from there, leaving OpenAI in the dust.
No, I don’t think there’s any grand conspiracy, but certainly MS was interested in leapfrogging Google by capturing the value from OpenAI from day one. As things began to fall apart there MS had vast amounts of money to throw at people to bring them into alignment. The idea of a buyout was probably on the table from day one, but not possible till now.
If there’s a warning, it’s to be very careful when choosing your partners and giving them enormous leverage on you.
Conspiracy theories that involve reptilian overlords and ancient aliens are suspect. Conspiracy theories that involve collusion to makes massive amounts of money are expected and should be the treated as the most likely scenario. Occam's razor does not apply to human behavior, as humans will do the most twisted things to gain power and wealth.
My theory of what happened is identical to yours, and is frankly one of the only theories that makes any sense. Everything else points to these people being mentally ill and irrational, and their success technically and monetarily does not point to that. It would be absurd to think they clown-showed themselves into billions of dollars.
Why would they be afraid of retaliation? They didn't sign sports contracts, they can just resign anytime, no? That just seems to overcomplicate things.
I mean, I don't actually believe this. But I am reminded of 2016 when the Turkish president headed off a "coup" and cemented his power.
More likely, this is a case of not letting a good crisis go to waste. I feel the board was probably watching their control over OpenAI slip away into the hands of Altman. They probably recognized that they had a shrinking window to refocus the company along lines they felt was in the spirit of the original non-profit charter.
However, it seems that they completely misjudged the feelings of their employees as well as the PR ability of Altman. No matter how many employees actually would prefer the original charter, social pressure is going to cause most employees to go with the crowd. The media is literally counting names at this point. People will notice those who don't sign, almost like a loyalty pledge.
However, Ilya's role in all of this remains a mystery. Why did he vote to oust Altman and Brockman? Why has he now recanted? That is a bigger mystery to me than why the board took this action in the first place.
"I deeply regret my participation in the board's actions. I never intended to harm OpenAI. I love everything we've built together and I will do everything I can to reunite the company."
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 new term for me); whatever that means
- Helen Toner — I don't know what exactly she does, again, "something-something Director of strategy" at Georgetown University, for such a young person
By the end of the week is over-optimistic. Foe the last 3 days feels like million year. I bet the company will be gone by the time Emmett Shear wakes up
It's not over until the last stone involved in the avalanche stops moving and it is anybody's guess right now what the final configuration will be.
But don't be surprised if Shear also walks before the week is out, if some board members resign but others try to hold on and if half of OpenAI's staff ends up at Microsoft.
Seems more damage control than power move. I'm sure their first choice was to reinstate Altman and get more control over OpenAI governance. What they've achieved here is temporarily neutralizing Altman/Brockman from starting a competitor, at the cost of potentially destroying OpenAI (who they remain dependent on for next couple of years) if too many people quit.
Seems a bit of a lose-lose for MSFT and OpenAI, even if best that MSFT could do to contain the situation. Competitors must be happy.
Can we have a quick moment of silence for Matt Levine? Between Friday afternoon and right now, he has probably had to rewrite today's Money Stuff column at least 5 or 6 times.
"Except that there is a post-credits scene in this sci-fi movie where Altman shows up for his first day of work at Microsoft with a box of his personal effects, and the box starts glowing and chuckles ominously. And in the sequel, six months later, he builds Microsoft God in Box, we are all enslaved by robots, the nonprofit board is like “we told you so,” and the godlike AI is like “ahahaha you fools, you trusted in the formalities of corporate governance, I outwitted you easily!” If your main worry is that Sam Altman is going to build a rogue AI unless he is checked by a nonprofit board, this weekend’s events did not improve matters!"
Deservedly or not, Satya Nadella will look like a genius in the aftermath. He has and will continue to leverage this situation to strengthen MSFT's position. Is there word of any other competitors attempting to capitalize here? Trying to poach talent? Anything...
If Microsoft emerges as the "winner" from all of them then I think we are all the "losers". Not that I think OpenAI was perfect or "good" just that MS taking the cake is not good for the rest of us. It already feels crazy that people are just fine with them owning what they do and how important it is to our development ecosystem (talking about things like GitHub/VSCode), I don't like the idea of them also owning the biggest AI initiative.
I will never not be mad at the fact that they built a developer base by making all their tech open source, only to take it all away once it became remotely financially viable to do so.
With how close "Open"AI is with Microsoft, it really does not seem like there is a functional difference in how they ethically approach AI at all.
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 shortsighted. Perhaps they should even try and bring Altman back, and reform themselves out of existence. But why would the vast majority of the workforce back an open letter failing to signal where they stand on the crucial issue - on the purpose of OpenAI and their collective work? Given the stakes which the AI community likes to claim are at issue in the development of AGI, that strikes me as strange and concerning.
> I don't really understanding why the workforce is swinging unambiguously behind Altman.
Maybe it has to do with them wanting to get rich by selling their shares - my understanding is there was an ongoing process to get that happening [1].
If Altman is out of the picture, it looks like Microsoft will assimilate a lot of OpenAI into a separate organisation and OpenAI's shares might become worthless.
> 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 charge.
Once again,
this is completely all speculation.
I have not spoken to anyone at Open AI
or anyone at Microsoft
or anyone at all really.
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.
Why should they trust the board? As the letter says, "Despite many requests for specific facts for your allegations, you have never provided any written evidence." If Altman took any specific action that violated the charter, the board should be open about it. Simply trying to make money does not violate the charter and is in fact essential to their mission. The GPT Store, cited as the final straw in leaks, is actually far cleaner money than investments from megacorps. Commercializing the product and selling it directly to consumers reduces dependence on Microsoft.
Ultimately people care a lot more about their compensation, since that is what pays the bills and puts food on the table.
Since OpenAI's commercial aspects are doomed now and it is uncertain whether they can continue operations if Microsoft withholds resources and consumers switch away to alternative LLM/embeddings serrvices with more level-headed leadership, OpenAI will eventually turn into a shell of itself, which affects compensation.
> I don't really understanding why the workforce is swinging unambiguously behind Altman.
Maybe because the alternative is being led by lunatics who think like this:
You also informed the leadership team that allowing the company to be destroyed “would be consistent with the mission.”
to which the only possible reaction is
What
The
Fuck?
That right there is what happens when you let "AI ethics" people get control of something. Why would anyone work for people who believe that OpenAI's mission is consistent with self-destruction? This is a comic book super-villain style of "ethics", one in which you conclude the village had to be destroyed in order to save it.
If you are a normal person, you want to work for people who think that your daily office output is actually pretty cool, not something that's going to destroy the world. A lot of people have asked what Altman was doing there and why people there are so loyal to him. It's obvious now that Altman's primary role at OpenAI was to be a normal leader that isn't in the grip of the EA Basilisk cult.
> Swisher reports that there are currently 700 employees as OpenAI and that more signatures are still being added to the letter. The letter appears to have been written before the events of last night, suggesting it has been circulating since closer to Altman’s firing. It also means that it may be too late for OpenAI’s board to act on the memo’s demands, if they even wished to do so.
So, 3/4 of the current board (excluding Ilya) held on despite this letter?
[+] [-] dang|2 years ago|reply
I've turned down the page size so everyone can see the threads, but you'll have to click through the More links at the bottom of the page to read all the comments, or like this:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38347868&p=2
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38347868&p=3
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38347868&p=4
etc...
[+] [-] breadwinner|2 years ago|reply
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] https://stratechery.com/2023/openais-misalignment-and-micros...
[+] [-] joshstrange|2 years ago|reply
Ilya votes for and stands behind decision to remove Altman, Altman goes to MS, other employees want him back or want to join him at MS and Ilya is one of them, just madness.
[+] [-] boh|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tedivm|2 years ago|reply
> In their letter, the OpenAI staff threaten to join Altman at Microsoft. “Microsoft has assured us that there are positions for all OpenAI employees at this new subsidiary should we choose to join," they write.
[+] [-] spinningslate|2 years ago|reply
Exactly. I'm curious about how much of this was planned vs emergent. I doubt it was all planned: it would take an extraordinary mind to foresee all the possible twists.
Equally, it's not entirely unpredictable. MS is the easiest to read: their moves to date have been really clear in wanting to be the primary commercial beneficiary of OAI's work.
OAI itself is less transpararent from the outside. There's a tension between the "humanity first" mantra that drove its inception, and the increasingly "commercial exploitation first" line that Altman was evidently driving.
As things stand, the outcome is pretty clear: if the choice was between humanity and commercial gain, the latter appears to have won.
[+] [-] paulpan|2 years ago|reply
Irony is that if a significant portion of OpenAI staff opt to join Microsoft, then Microsoft essentially killed their own $13B investment in OpenAI earlier this year. Better than acquiring for $80B+ I suppose.
[+] [-] trinsic2|2 years ago|reply
Sounds like that's what someone wants and is trying to obfuscate what's going on behind the scenes.
If Windows 11 shows us anything about Microsoft's monopolistic behavior, having them be the ring of power for LMM's makes the future of humanity look very bleak.
[+] [-] boringg|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tannhaeuser|2 years ago|reply
Didn't follow this closely, but isn't that implicitly what an ex-CEO could have possibly been accused off ie. not acting in the company's best interest but someone else's? Not unprecedented either eg. the case of Nokia/Elop.
[+] [-] mongol|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ulfw|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] BryantD|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|2 years ago|reply
[1] https://www.pbs.org/transistor/background1/corgs/fairchild.h...
[+] [-] ethbr1|2 years ago|reply
Wasn't a key enabler of early transitor work that required capital investment was modest?
SotA AI research seems to be well past that point.
[+] [-] kossTKR|2 years ago|reply
Microsoft gobbles up all talent from OpenAI as they just gave everyone a position.
So we went from "Faux NGO" to, "For profit", to "100% Closed".
[+] [-] jurgenaut23|2 years ago|reply
Then, Ilya would apologize publicly for "making a huge mistake" and, after some period, would join Microsoft as well, effectively robbing OpenAI from everything of value. The motive? Unlocking the full financial potential of ChatGPT, which was until then locked down by the non-profit nature of its owner.
Of course, in this context, the $10 billion deal between Microsoft and OpenAI is part of the scheme, especially the part where Microsoft has full rights over ChatGPT IP, so that they can just fork the whole codebase and take it from there, leaving OpenAI in the dust.
But no, that's not possible.
[+] [-] dougmwne|2 years ago|reply
If there’s a warning, it’s to be very careful when choosing your partners and giving them enormous leverage on you.
[+] [-] colordrops|2 years ago|reply
My theory of what happened is identical to yours, and is frankly one of the only theories that makes any sense. Everything else points to these people being mentally ill and irrational, and their success technically and monetarily does not point to that. It would be absurd to think they clown-showed themselves into billions of dollars.
[+] [-] jowea|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zoogeny|2 years ago|reply
More likely, this is a case of not letting a good crisis go to waste. I feel the board was probably watching their control over OpenAI slip away into the hands of Altman. They probably recognized that they had a shrinking window to refocus the company along lines they felt was in the spirit of the original non-profit charter.
However, it seems that they completely misjudged the feelings of their employees as well as the PR ability of Altman. No matter how many employees actually would prefer the original charter, social pressure is going to cause most employees to go with the crowd. The media is literally counting names at this point. People will notice those who don't sign, almost like a loyalty pledge.
However, Ilya's role in all of this remains a mystery. Why did he vote to oust Altman and Brockman? Why has he now recanted? That is a bigger mystery to me than why the board took this action in the first place.
[+] [-] Schroedingers2c|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paulddraper|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sesutton|2 years ago|reply
"I deeply regret my participation in the board's actions. I never intended to harm OpenAI. I love everything we've built together and I will do everything I can to reunite the company."
https://twitter.com/ilyasut/status/1726590052392956028
[+] [-] kashyapc|2 years ago|reply
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 new term for me); whatever that means
- Helen Toner — I don't know what exactly she does, again, "something-something Director of strategy" at Georgetown University, for such a young person
No wise veterans here to temper the adrenaline?
Edit: the term clusterf*** comes to mind here.
[+] [-] SeanAnderson|2 years ago|reply
Did not expect to see this whole thing still escalating! WOW! What a power move by MSFT.
I'm not even sure OpenAI will exist by the end of the week at this rate. Holy moly.
[+] [-] alvis|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jacquesm|2 years ago|reply
But don't be surprised if Shear also walks before the week is out, if some board members resign but others try to hold on and if half of OpenAI's staff ends up at Microsoft.
[+] [-] HarHarVeryFunny|2 years ago|reply
Seems a bit of a lose-lose for MSFT and OpenAI, even if best that MSFT could do to contain the situation. Competitors must be happy.
[+] [-] RivieraKid|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] leroy_masochist|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] defaultcompany|2 years ago|reply
Reading Matt Levine is such a joy.
[+] [-] hotsauceror|2 years ago|reply
I think he said once that there's an ETF that trades on when he takes vacations, because they keep coinciding with Events Of Note.
[+] [-] soderfoo|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] godzillabrennus|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] mjirv|2 years ago|reply
“Microsoft has assured us that there are positions for all OpenAl employees at this new subsidiary should we choose to join.”
[+] [-] joshstrange|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _vere|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wxw|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gadders|2 years ago|reply
Reminds me a bit of the Open AI board. Most of them I'd never heard of either.
[+] [-] Emma_Goldman|2 years ago|reply
The board may have been incompetent and shortsighted. Perhaps they should even try and bring Altman back, and reform themselves out of existence. But why would the vast majority of the workforce back an open letter failing to signal where they stand on the crucial issue - on the purpose of OpenAI and their collective work? Given the stakes which the AI community likes to claim are at issue in the development of AGI, that strikes me as strange and concerning.
[1] https://openai.com/charter
[+] [-] FartyMcFarter|2 years ago|reply
Maybe it has to do with them wanting to get rich by selling their shares - my understanding is there was an ongoing process to get that happening [1].
If Altman is out of the picture, it looks like Microsoft will assimilate a lot of OpenAI into a separate organisation and OpenAI's shares might become worthless.
[1] https://www.financemagnates.com/fintech/openai-in-talks-to-s...
[+] [-] mcny|2 years ago|reply
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 charge.
Once again, this is completely all speculation. I have not spoken to anyone at Open AI or anyone at Microsoft or anyone at all really.
[+] [-] dayjah|2 years ago|reply
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.
[+] [-] paulddraper|2 years ago|reply
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.)
[+] [-] Sunhold|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] supriyo-biswas|2 years ago|reply
Since OpenAI's commercial aspects are doomed now and it is uncertain whether they can continue operations if Microsoft withholds resources and consumers switch away to alternative LLM/embeddings serrvices with more level-headed leadership, OpenAI will eventually turn into a shell of itself, which affects compensation.
[+] [-] nvm0n2|2 years ago|reply
Maybe because the alternative is being led by lunatics who think like this:
You also informed the leadership team that allowing the company to be destroyed “would be consistent with the mission.”
to which the only possible reaction is
What
The
Fuck?
That right there is what happens when you let "AI ethics" people get control of something. Why would anyone work for people who believe that OpenAI's mission is consistent with self-destruction? This is a comic book super-villain style of "ethics", one in which you conclude the village had to be destroyed in order to save it.
If you are a normal person, you want to work for people who think that your daily office output is actually pretty cool, not something that's going to destroy the world. A lot of people have asked what Altman was doing there and why people there are so loyal to him. It's obvious now that Altman's primary role at OpenAI was to be a normal leader that isn't in the grip of the EA Basilisk cult.
[+] [-] ekojs|2 years ago|reply
> Swisher reports that there are currently 700 employees as OpenAI and that more signatures are still being added to the letter. The letter appears to have been written before the events of last night, suggesting it has been circulating since closer to Altman’s firing. It also means that it may be too late for OpenAI’s board to act on the memo’s demands, if they even wished to do so.
So, 3/4 of the current board (excluding Ilya) held on despite this letter?
[1]: https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/20/23968988/openai-employee...