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Is it possible this was supposed to be on-background and not published for public consumption and there was a miscommunication? When I read the article last wee

Is it possible this was supposed to be on-background and not published for public consumption and there was a miscommunication? When I read the article last week, I was a little surprised it was published because it did read very much like the sort of meeting you have with people behind closed doors that aren’t secret the same way it would be under and NDA, but that are truly designed to offer background context and not to be published as a transcript. That scenario feels more likely to me than that there was something said that is no longer true, but I don’t know. From an optics perspective, it would probably have been better to just let the article stand rather than requesting that it get removed (unless there were fundamental misrepresentations of misunderstandings of what was said), but it could also be a situation where no one expected the article's removal to be noticed.

daveguy 3y ago
> but it could also be a situation where no one expected the article's removal to be noticed. This seems least likely. Hard to tell if it's misrepresentation or revealing secrets. Given how blunt, straightforward, and detailed the article was, I'd say it either revealed operational secrets that Microsoft or OpenAI didn't want to reveal. Especially those first few paragraphs that told specifica about shortcomings and what advancements are needed. Or it said they wouldn't compete in a broad category that they definitely will be competing.
- filmgirlcw 3y ago
  Having been on both sides of these types of meetings, I don’t think the saying they won’t compete thing and that being false is realistic. If you meet with people/partners/influencers/press, you typically don’t lie like this, especially when you’re of the size/attention of OpenAI (there are always exceptions but I just don’t see it here). There are situations where you don’t want what are your legitimate and current plans put out in the world in writing by people other than you, especially if they are things that could change. I think there is a scenario where OpenAI today doesn’t intend to compete with its API users, but doesn’t want to make that a definitive statement when it might not know the future could hold or to account for parallel lines of development (if OpenAI was already working on an area and API users decide to get into that space too, how does that work. That happens at companies that offer both platforms and their own products all the time and it is rarely nefarious (obviously, sometimes it is), but I can see how that wouldn’t want to be a public message OpenAI would want out there, particularly if it isn’t directly from them. That said, I really do have to think this was a meeting that was designed to be on background and not represented as “OpenAI reveals their roadmap” and that this was a miscommunication from the jump. Just for reference, having been in these sorts of meetings as both a reporter/analyst and as the person providing information, it isn’t uncommon to have a set of guidelines known as “Chatham House Rules” [1] or something similar, where you can use the information, but not state it verbatim from notes or directly quote. But people that aren’t primarily reporters or analysts or lobbyists whatever, that isn’t always understood. Which is why you need to be explicit in the terms of the publicness of the meeting. Again, this is only a guess (but it is backed up by 15 years of professional work as both a reporter/analyst as well as someone who is often sent to talk to the press/influencers/customers/users in situations that have varying degrees of on/off-recordness, I have to think this was just a misunderstanding of how publicly the contents of a conversation were designed to be. Again, I don’t think that asking people to take something like this down is the right move most of the time, especially if the article already got attention and write ups. Just chalk it up to a loss and commit to explaining expectations better in the future (if someone was clear on the rules of disclosure and violates them, that’s entirely different. I have zero reason to believe that happened here). If someone posts something and it doesn’t hit the front page of hacker news and you catch it in the first five or ten minutes, yeah, asking to take it down might be OK — but in general, I say let it go. That said, I can’t help but wonder if it was a strategic mistake, not realizing that the takedown of the article would be noticed. The truth is, we won’t know unless Raza or Sam comments, and neither has a real incentive to comment IMHO. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_House_Rule https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_House_Rule
  - user_named 3y ago
    Your writing is way too verbose.
rmbyrro 3y ago
I read the archive and didn't have the same impression. This looks like regular Altman interview. I guess they didn't want to be held accountable to the non-compete in the future.
- filmgirlcw 3y ago
  That’s possible for sure, but knowing Sam (and having interviewed him going as far back as 2007 or 2008 when we were both babies), it’s hard for me to believe he’d say something like that in an on-record interview. I could be wrong, obviously, but I just don’t find it likely. I find it more likely that it was intended to be more on-background and that they wasn’t communicated appropriately — but again, I could be wrong.

daveguy 3y ago

> but it could also be a situation where no one expected the article's removal to be noticed. This seems least likely. Hard to tell if it's misrepresentation or revealing secrets. Given how blunt, straightforward, and detailed the article was, I'd say it either revealed operational secrets that Microsoft or OpenAI didn't want to reveal. Especially those first few paragraphs that told specifica about shortcomings and what advancements are needed. Or it said they wouldn't compete in a broad category that they definitely will be competing.

filmgirlcw 3y ago
Having been on both sides of these types of meetings, I don’t think the saying they won’t compete thing and that being false is realistic. If you meet with people/partners/influencers/press, you typically don’t lie like this, especially when you’re of the size/attention of OpenAI (there are always exceptions but I just don’t see it here). There are situations where you don’t want what are your legitimate and current plans put out in the world in writing by people other than you, especially if they are things that could change. I think there is a scenario where OpenAI today doesn’t intend to compete with its API users, but doesn’t want to make that a definitive statement when it might not know the future could hold or to account for parallel lines of development (if OpenAI was already working on an area and API users decide to get into that space too, how does that work. That happens at companies that offer both platforms and their own products all the time and it is rarely nefarious (obviously, sometimes it is), but I can see how that wouldn’t want to be a public message OpenAI would want out there, particularly if it isn’t directly from them. That said, I really do have to think this was a meeting that was designed to be on background and not represented as “OpenAI reveals their roadmap” and that this was a miscommunication from the jump. Just for reference, having been in these sorts of meetings as both a reporter/analyst and as the person providing information, it isn’t uncommon to have a set of guidelines known as “Chatham House Rules” [1] or something similar, where you can use the information, but not state it verbatim from notes or directly quote. But people that aren’t primarily reporters or analysts or lobbyists whatever, that isn’t always understood. Which is why you need to be explicit in the terms of the publicness of the meeting. Again, this is only a guess (but it is backed up by 15 years of professional work as both a reporter/analyst as well as someone who is often sent to talk to the press/influencers/customers/users in situations that have varying degrees of on/off-recordness, I have to think this was just a misunderstanding of how publicly the contents of a conversation were designed to be. Again, I don’t think that asking people to take something like this down is the right move most of the time, especially if the article already got attention and write ups. Just chalk it up to a loss and commit to explaining expectations better in the future (if someone was clear on the rules of disclosure and violates them, that’s entirely different. I have zero reason to believe that happened here). If someone posts something and it doesn’t hit the front page of hacker news and you catch it in the first five or ten minutes, yeah, asking to take it down might be OK — but in general, I say let it go. That said, I can’t help but wonder if it was a strategic mistake, not realizing that the takedown of the article would be noticed. The truth is, we won’t know unless Raza or Sam comments, and neither has a real incentive to comment IMHO. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_House_Rule https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_House_Rule
- user_named 3y ago
  Your writing is way too verbose.

rmbyrro 3y ago

I read the archive and didn't have the same impression. This looks like regular Altman interview. I guess they didn't want to be held accountable to the non-compete in the future.

filmgirlcw 3y ago
That’s possible for sure, but knowing Sam (and having interviewed him going as far back as 2007 or 2008 when we were both babies), it’s hard for me to believe he’d say something like that in an on-record interview. I could be wrong, obviously, but I just don’t find it likely. I find it more likely that it was intended to be more on-background and that they wasn’t communicated appropriately — but again, I could be wrong.