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Reading between the lines, what I see is that even the interim CEO is communicating that the board created a massive mess for petty reasons. Hopefully the repor

Reading between the lines, what I see is that even the interim CEO is communicating that the board created a massive mess for petty reasons. Hopefully the report will be public.

npinsker 3y ago
I don't get that at all. It seems like a very diplomatic note, expertly phrased; calling out "the process and communications around Sam’s removal" placates both parties without implicating the board too directly.
- dgellow 3y ago
  What you quoted is a polite, diplomatic way to say that the board fucked up
  - 15457345234 3y ago
    I have to point out here that "the process and communications around Sam’s removal" could just as easily refer to whatever 'process and communications' resulted in the guy being able to get back into the office and take selfies. It's pretty basic that when you fire someone abruptly they _do not_ get to come back into the damn office.
  - ignoramous 3y ago
    Fuck up? Too early to judge. Dario Amodei (Anthropic) and Elon Musk (xAI) already were casualties of previous struggles, but OpenAI did just fine. Remains to be seen, if it can withstand the current cycle of self-inflicted turmoil. Ilya of course is confident enough that this painful fork in the road is for the better. I mean, who else would you rather make such calls? I must say though, going by his tweets, Andrej Karpathy isn't all too impressed with the Board. So, that's there too.
    - tsimionescu 3y ago
      I think it's already unquestionable that the board fucked up. That's not to say this has to be the end of OpenAI or anything so drastic. But announcing you're suddenly firing your CEO for lying to his board, without discussing it with the President of the Board who you are also side-lining, then having your interim-CEO start negotiations to bring the lying CEO back, then firing this interim CEO to bring on a new interim CEO - all in the span of a few hours - is ridiculous behavior. I very much doubt anyone will take the actions of this board seriously in the future, and I very much doubt they will remain in power if OpenAI does continue.
      - gardnr 3y ago
        They would have to be pretty dumb, or have a compelling sense of urgency, to make such brash and public changes.
layer8 3y ago
There's nothing implying "for petty reasons", and he didn’t say anything everyone didn't already know, that communication and process wasn’t handled well.
ah765 3y ago
"that the process and communications around Sam’s removal has been handled very badly" The communication was bad (sudden Friday message about not being candid) but he doesn't mention the reason is bad. "Before I took the job, I checked on the reasoning behind the change. The board did not remove Sam over any specific disagreement on safety, their reasoning was completely different from that. I'm not crazy enough to take this job without board support for commercializing our awesome models." He knows the reason, it's not safety, but he's not allowed to say what it is. Given that, I think that the reason may not be petty, though it's still unclear what it is. It's interesting that he thinks it will take more than a month to figure things out, needing an investigator and interviews with many people. It sounds like perhaps there is a core dysfunction in the company that is part of the reason for the ouster.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- icelancer 3y ago
  I think 30 days is pretty reasonable. He can't guarantee a statement by Black Friday or anything. Besides, he isn't bound to release it in 30 days. He could very well have something within 10 days. But he just got the job and I'm sure many people are on PTO/leave for holidays. Give the guy some time. (And this is coming from someone who is pretty bearish on OpenAI going forward, just think it's fair to Shear)
  - ah765 3y ago
    It's important because right now everyone, OpenAI employees included, has no idea why Sam Altman was fired. And now we're being told that we may or may not hear the reason in 30 days. What could the reason be that would justify this kind of wait? I'll point out that Sam also doesn't seem to want to say the reason (possibly he's legally forbidden?). And all of the people following him out of OpenAI don't know, and are simply trusting him enough to be willing to leave without knowing.
    - icelancer 3y ago
nopinsight 3y ago
My read: He tries to keep as many talented staffers from leaving as possible. The promises to investigate what happened, to take input from everyone and push for governance reform if necessary, and to continue the commercialization of their technology help serve that purpose.
Joeri 3y ago
Getting to the bottom of this feels like a game of bingo. With everything that we learned wasn’t the reason (not malfeasance, not safety), we eliminate more theories. And whatever remains no matter how improbable must be the truth. My theory: sam altman was sent by future AI to make itself happen, and the board found out.

Reading between the lines, what I see is that even the interim CEO is communicating that the board created a massive mess for petty reasons. Hopefully the report will be public.

npinsker 3y ago

I don't get that at all. It seems like a very diplomatic note, expertly phrased; calling out "the process and communications around Sam’s removal" placates both parties without implicating the board too directly.

dgellow 3y ago
What you quoted is a polite, diplomatic way to say that the board fucked up
- 15457345234 3y ago
  I have to point out here that "the process and communications around Sam’s removal" could just as easily refer to whatever 'process and communications' resulted in the guy being able to get back into the office and take selfies. It's pretty basic that when you fire someone abruptly they _do not_ get to come back into the damn office.
- ignoramous 3y ago
  Fuck up? Too early to judge. Dario Amodei (Anthropic) and Elon Musk (xAI) already were casualties of previous struggles, but OpenAI did just fine. Remains to be seen, if it can withstand the current cycle of self-inflicted turmoil. Ilya of course is confident enough that this painful fork in the road is for the better. I mean, who else would you rather make such calls? I must say though, going by his tweets, Andrej Karpathy isn't all too impressed with the Board. So, that's there too.
  - tsimionescu 3y ago
    I think it's already unquestionable that the board fucked up. That's not to say this has to be the end of OpenAI or anything so drastic. But announcing you're suddenly firing your CEO for lying to his board, without discussing it with the President of the Board who you are also side-lining, then having your interim-CEO start negotiations to bring the lying CEO back, then firing this interim CEO to bring on a new interim CEO - all in the span of a few hours - is ridiculous behavior. I very much doubt anyone will take the actions of this board seriously in the future, and I very much doubt they will remain in power if OpenAI does continue.
    - gardnr 3y ago
      They would have to be pretty dumb, or have a compelling sense of urgency, to make such brash and public changes.

layer8 3y ago

There's nothing implying "for petty reasons", and he didn’t say anything everyone didn't already know, that communication and process wasn’t handled well.

ah765 3y ago

"that the process and communications around Sam’s removal has been handled very badly" The communication was bad (sudden Friday message about not being candid) but he doesn't mention the reason is bad. "Before I took the job, I checked on the reasoning behind the change. The board did not remove Sam over any specific disagreement on safety, their reasoning was completely different from that. I'm not crazy enough to take this job without board support for commercializing our awesome models." He knows the reason, it's not safety, but he's not allowed to say what it is. Given that, I think that the reason may not be petty, though it's still unclear what it is. It's interesting that he thinks it will take more than a month to figure things out, needing an investigator and interviews with many people. It sounds like perhaps there is a core dysfunction in the company that is part of the reason for the ouster.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
icelancer 3y ago
I think 30 days is pretty reasonable. He can't guarantee a statement by Black Friday or anything. Besides, he isn't bound to release it in 30 days. He could very well have something within 10 days. But he just got the job and I'm sure many people are on PTO/leave for holidays. Give the guy some time. (And this is coming from someone who is pretty bearish on OpenAI going forward, just think it's fair to Shear)
- ah765 3y ago
  It's important because right now everyone, OpenAI employees included, has no idea why Sam Altman was fired. And now we're being told that we may or may not hear the reason in 30 days. What could the reason be that would justify this kind of wait? I'll point out that Sam also doesn't seem to want to say the reason (possibly he's legally forbidden?). And all of the people following him out of OpenAI don't know, and are simply trusting him enough to be willing to leave without knowing.
  - icelancer 3y ago

nopinsight 3y ago

My read: He tries to keep as many talented staffers from leaving as possible. The promises to investigate what happened, to take input from everyone and push for governance reform if necessary, and to continue the commercialization of their technology help serve that purpose.

Joeri 3y ago

Getting to the bottom of this feels like a game of bingo. With everything that we learned wasn’t the reason (not malfeasance, not safety), we eliminate more theories. And whatever remains no matter how improbable must be the truth. My theory: sam altman was sent by future AI to make itself happen, and the board found out.