Sam Altman tells staff there’s no plan for him to receive ‘giant equity stake’

[lolinder]

The timing of the executive departures is extremely suspicious. There's clearly a major shift happening here in Altman's favor, and even if he's not getting equity now it seems inevitable at this point.

As others have noted, the wording here is also highly suspect: "no current plans" for a "giant equity stake" gives him at least two different paths to claim he never lied about the situation if and when he gets equity.

[JumpCrisscross]

I’m reading the sequel to Robert Grave’s classic, I, Claudius. In it, Cæsar Claudius describes the Imperial Senate’s process of proactive prostration.

The Emperor never requests favours. Instead, ambitious Senators must guess his desires and offer them to him, at which point a song and dance is done about his refusing and the Senate insisting and him, reluctantly, accepting the honor.

[hintymad]

So did emperors in other countries. They didn’t want to be the new emperors after a successful usurpation. Instead, their followers needed to plead or even force them to accept the throne

[zerocrates]

When you're saying the investors are demanding it, the board is saying they've discussed it but don't have specific numbers, saying there are no "current plans" is pretty weak tea as a denial. Okay, there's no plan today but you're... actively working on one?

[quantified]

There are concepts of a plan, though.

[mewpmewp2]

[flagged]

[insane_dreamer]

How much credibility do you reckon Sam Altman's words have these days?

[outside1234]

Basically none. He isn’t known as Scam Altman in the valley for nothing.

[minwcnt5]

Indeed, I heard there are plans for a giant equity stake to be awarded to a company called Notsam Naltman, LLC, which would leave nothing left to give to Sam Altman.

[joshdavham]

> investors have raised concerns about Altman not having equity in the high-valued artificial intelligence company that he co-founded

I think here lies the interesting point. I’m not gonna try to mindread Sam and guess at what his true intentions are, but the investors’ intentions are clear: align Sam’s incentives with profit. I wish him the best of luck in navigating this.

[7e]

Sam already has equity in OpenAI though YC.

[minwcnt5]

He went on to tell them that he's only expecting a wee little equity stake that's just a single digit percentage.

[throwup238]

There's a rather simple reason why this is believable: as a board member of OpenAI Inc (the non profit), he is a disqualified person under self dealing rules [1][2]. If he actually gave himself a multi-billion dollar stake in the for-profit OpenAI Global LLC, it'd be the biggest self-dealing investigation in the history of nonprofits. The IRS and CA FTB would come down hard and OpenAI & Sam would spend a year+ dealing with the fallout.

[1] https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/private-foundation...

[2] https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/private-foundation...

[JumpCrisscross]

OpenAI needs money. To do that it must promise to incorporate. It cannot incorporate and then raise funds, because that would take time and give the non-profit blocking leverage. So Altman must raise money while giving a promise, no promise, because the company and non-profit are at arms length.

That said, this is a public announcement. There is motivation more than legal for making this a public concern.

[lolinder]

Isn't this as simple as him just stepping down from the board? He already gutted it and replaced the members with his own supporters, he doesn't actually need to be on it anymore when it stops being useful.

[fblp]

If he does get equity (not options) then he'll have to pay taxes on it at the 409a valuation which is usually lower than market, but would still be crazy high.

[Apocryphon]

Why would he care about mere money when he gets to be the one to merge with the thing, burning like the brightest star?

[Simulacra]

I'm trying not to be pessimistic, but the level of trust and faith that I have in Sam Altman is very low.

[blackeyeblitzar]

Whenever I see him speak, he is vague and evasive. He either is untrustworthy or just has no idea what’s going on.

[coldn00dl3s]

I am pretty sure this started brewing in the pot when o1 and it's pricing models were conceptualized

[projectileboy]

He would have to deny it, even if there were none of the shenanigans surrounding all this.

[talldayo]

That's exactly what someone trying to maximize the value of their equity would say.

[Lerc]

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Kafkatrap#Noun

>A sophistical rhetorical device in which any denial by an accused person serves as evidence of guilt.

[outside1234]

I think the only surprise in this is that he isn’t launching a crypto rug pull.

[CatWChainsaw]

He tried already with Worldcoin.

[replwoacause]

But I’ve got good news for anybody in the market for one: Trump just launched his poop log crypto scam.

[georgeecollins]

I think he deserves every dollar he can get to protect us from robot overlords!

[outside1234]

But wait! OpenAI are the robot overlords!