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Good. Two of them aren't even qualified to be on the board of a kid's lemonade stand.

by DebtDeflation 3y ago

nemo44x 3y ago
[flagged]
- rlt 3y ago
  Without commenting on their competency as board members... Describing Tasha McCauley as "an actor's wife" feels a bit sexist. She's apparently a scientist and founder of a (failed?) startup. Is there any evidence Helen Toner is a "Chinese spy"? (having lived in Beijing isn't evidence)
Terretta 3y ago
Assuming you don't mean the insiders or the Quora CEO, which aspects of these remaining backgrounds do you find unusual for a Silicon Valley board member? Tasha McCauley is an adjunct senior management scientist at RAND Corporation, a job she started earlier in 2023, according to her LinkedIn profile. She previously cofounded Fellow Robots, a startup she launched with a colleague from Singularity University, where she’d served as a director of an innovation lab, and then cofounded GeoSim Systems, a geospatial technology startup where she served as CEO until last year. With her husband Joseph Gorden-Levitt, she was a signer of the Asilomar AI Principles, a set of 23 AI governance principles published in 2017. (Altman, OpenAI cofounder Iyla Sutskever and former board director Elon Musk also signed.) McCauley currently sits on the advisory board of British-founded international Center for the Governance of AI alongside fellow OpenAI director Helen Toner. And she’s tied to the Effective Altruism movement through the Centre for Effective Altruism; McCauley sits on the U.K. board of the Effective Ventures Foundation, its parent organization. Helen Toner, director of strategy and foundational research grants at Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, joined OpenAI’s board of directors in September 2021. Her role: to think about safety in a world where OpenAI’s creation had global influence. “I greatly value Helen’s deep thinking around the long-term risks and effects of AI,” Brockman said in a statement at the time. More recently, Toner has been making headlines as an expert on China’s AI landscape and the potential role of AI regulation in a geopolitical face-off with the Asian giant. Toner had lived in Beijing in between roles at Open Philanthropy and her current job at CSET, researching its AI ecosystem, per her corporate biography. In June, she co-authored an essay for Foreign Affairs on “The Illusion of China’s AI Prowess” that argued — in opposition to Altman’s cited U.S. Senate testimony — that regulation wouldn’t slow down the U.S. in a race between the two nations. . . . EDIT TO ADD: The question wasn't whether this is scintillating substance. The question was, in what way is this unusual in Silicon Valley. The answer is that it's not.
- jxi 3y ago
  None of that sounds like actual work or results. It's just a bunch of empty business speak. They are definitely not qualified to serve on the board of a company like OpenAI.
  - jsnell 3y ago
    Would Altman's bio be any more impressive if framed the same way? A trash tier startup, failing upwards to a VC, and starting one of the sleziest cryptocurrencies around. Sure sounds like no actual work, qualifications, competence or results.
    - jxi 3y ago
      Their achievements are already framed in their best light. Hopefully you're able to tell the difference between serving as CEO or president of real reputable companies (the "trash tier startup" still exited for mid-8 figures) versus what looks like being a figure head for fake companies.
    - eddtries 3y ago
      He was president of YC, I think it's fair to say people will think he's got a better set of credentials on a YC forum than some omg-ai-is-dangerous-please-fund-me think tank thinker.
  - yowzadave 3y ago
    > "a company like OpenAI" Maybe the problem is the meteoric rise of OpenAI--at the time this board was instituted, the company was much smaller, and wouldn't have been able to draw a more illustrious set of board members?
    - sumedh 3y ago
      Didnt they have Elon Musk and Jessica Livingston as founding members, their social network would have someone with more credibility to be on the board compared to the current members.
AnonymousPlanet 3y ago
Looking at their CVs, they're more qualified than some rando on the internet. So from my point of view, they look more qualified than you, DebtDeflation, rando from the internet.
- spaceman_2020 3y ago
  The GP never claimed to be eligible to serve on the board, so the attack is unwarranted.
  - AnonymousPlanet 3y ago
    It's perfectly warranted to call someone out on a claim that board members wouldn't qualify for a kid's lemonade stand.
- johnfn 3y ago
  I don’t need to be an Olympian to know that my kid isn’t ready yet.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - fnfjfk 3y ago
    An even better example, as someone that also could not do a trick in a half pipe: https://deadspin.com/the-winter-olympics-feature-2-951-of-the-world-s-greate-1823138678 https://deadspin.com/the-winter-olympics-feature-2-951-of-th...

Good. Two of them aren't even qualified to be on the board of a kid's lemonade stand.

nemo44x 3y ago

[flagged]

rlt 3y ago
Without commenting on their competency as board members... Describing Tasha McCauley as "an actor's wife" feels a bit sexist. She's apparently a scientist and founder of a (failed?) startup. Is there any evidence Helen Toner is a "Chinese spy"? (having lived in Beijing isn't evidence)

Terretta 3y ago

Assuming you don't mean the insiders or the Quora CEO, which aspects of these remaining backgrounds do you find unusual for a Silicon Valley board member? Tasha McCauley is an adjunct senior management scientist at RAND Corporation, a job she started earlier in 2023, according to her LinkedIn profile. She previously cofounded Fellow Robots, a startup she launched with a colleague from Singularity University, where she’d served as a director of an innovation lab, and then cofounded GeoSim Systems, a geospatial technology startup where she served as CEO until last year. With her husband Joseph Gorden-Levitt, she was a signer of the Asilomar AI Principles, a set of 23 AI governance principles published in 2017. (Altman, OpenAI cofounder Iyla Sutskever and former board director Elon Musk also signed.) McCauley currently sits on the advisory board of British-founded international Center for the Governance of AI alongside fellow OpenAI director Helen Toner. And she’s tied to the Effective Altruism movement through the Centre for Effective Altruism; McCauley sits on the U.K. board of the Effective Ventures Foundation, its parent organization. Helen Toner, director of strategy and foundational research grants at Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, joined OpenAI’s board of directors in September 2021. Her role: to think about safety in a world where OpenAI’s creation had global influence. “I greatly value Helen’s deep thinking around the long-term risks and effects of AI,” Brockman said in a statement at the time. More recently, Toner has been making headlines as an expert on China’s AI landscape and the potential role of AI regulation in a geopolitical face-off with the Asian giant. Toner had lived in Beijing in between roles at Open Philanthropy and her current job at CSET, researching its AI ecosystem, per her corporate biography. In June, she co-authored an essay for Foreign Affairs on “The Illusion of China’s AI Prowess” that argued — in opposition to Altman’s cited U.S. Senate testimony — that regulation wouldn’t slow down the U.S. in a race between the two nations. . . . EDIT TO ADD: The question wasn't whether this is scintillating substance. The question was, in what way is this unusual in Silicon Valley. The answer is that it's not.

jxi 3y ago
None of that sounds like actual work or results. It's just a bunch of empty business speak. They are definitely not qualified to serve on the board of a company like OpenAI.
- jsnell 3y ago
  Would Altman's bio be any more impressive if framed the same way? A trash tier startup, failing upwards to a VC, and starting one of the sleziest cryptocurrencies around. Sure sounds like no actual work, qualifications, competence or results.
  - jxi 3y ago
    Their achievements are already framed in their best light. Hopefully you're able to tell the difference between serving as CEO or president of real reputable companies (the "trash tier startup" still exited for mid-8 figures) versus what looks like being a figure head for fake companies.
  - eddtries 3y ago
    He was president of YC, I think it's fair to say people will think he's got a better set of credentials on a YC forum than some omg-ai-is-dangerous-please-fund-me think tank thinker.
- yowzadave 3y ago
  > "a company like OpenAI" Maybe the problem is the meteoric rise of OpenAI--at the time this board was instituted, the company was much smaller, and wouldn't have been able to draw a more illustrious set of board members?
  - sumedh 3y ago
    Didnt they have Elon Musk and Jessica Livingston as founding members, their social network would have someone with more credibility to be on the board compared to the current members.

AnonymousPlanet 3y ago

Looking at their CVs, they're more qualified than some rando on the internet. So from my point of view, they look more qualified than you, DebtDeflation, rando from the internet.

spaceman_2020 3y ago
The GP never claimed to be eligible to serve on the board, so the attack is unwarranted.
- AnonymousPlanet 3y ago
  It's perfectly warranted to call someone out on a claim that board members wouldn't qualify for a kid's lemonade stand.
johnfn 3y ago
I don’t need to be an Olympian to know that my kid isn’t ready yet.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- fnfjfk 3y ago
  An even better example, as someone that also could not do a trick in a half pipe: https://deadspin.com/the-winter-olympics-feature-2-951-of-the-world-s-greate-1823138678 https://deadspin.com/the-winter-olympics-feature-2-951-of-th...