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As of 10am PT, 700 of 770 employees have signed the call for board resignation. [1] [1] https://twitter.com/joannejang/status/1726667504133808242 https://twitt
by paulddraper 3y ago
As of 10am PT, 700 of 770 employees have signed the call for board resignation. [1]
[1] https://twitter.com/joannejang/status/1726667504133808242 https://twitter.com/joannejang/status/1726667504133808242
- tacone 3y agoIncredible. Is this unprecedented or have been other cases in history where the vast majority of employees standup against the board in favor of their CEO?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- selimthegrim 3y agoMarket Basket.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- anonymouskimmer 3y agoI had to click too many links to discover the story, so here's a direct link to the New England Market Basket story: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_Basket_(New_England)#2014_firing_of_Arthur_T._Demoulas_and_protests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_Basket_(New_England)#20...
- abnry 3y agoOh yes, I lived through this and it was fascinating to see. Very rarely does the big boss get the support of the employees to the extent they are willing to strike. The issue was that Artie T. and his cousin Artie S. (confusingly they had the same first name) were both roughly 50% owners and at odds. Artie S. wanted to sell the grocery chain to some big public corporation, IIRC. Just before, Artie T had an outstanding 4% off on all purchases for many months, as some sort of very generous promo. It sounded like he really treated his employees and his customers (community) well. You can get all inspirational about it, but he described supplying food to New England communities as an important thing to do. Which it is.
- nightski 3y agoI highly doubt this is directly in support of Altman and more about not imploding the company they work for. But you never know.
- debacle 3y agoCould also be an indictment of the new CEO, who is no Sam Altman.
- gkoberger 3y agoI'm sure this is a big part of it. But everyone I know at OpenAI (and outside) is a huge Sam fan.
- mycologos 3y ago> everyone I know at OpenAI (and outside) is a huge Sam fan Everyone you know is a huge Sam fan? What?
- checkyoursudo 3y agoI was going to say, I wouldn’t be surprised if I am one of only a handful of the people whom I know who even know who sama is.
- stingraycharles 3y agoI reckon the people working at OpenAI know who sama is, though.
- paulddraper 3y agoJobs was fired from Apple, and a number of employees followed him to Next. Different, but that's the closest parallel.
- Wytwwww 3y agoOnly a very small number of people left with Jobs. Of course, probably mainly because he couldn't necessarily afford to hire more without the backing of a trillion-dollar corporation...
- _zoltan_ 3y agoApple back then was not a trillion dollar corporation.
- varjag 3y agoMicrosoft now is.
- dimask 3y agoImagine if Jobs had gone to M$.
- KerrAvon 3y agoNo, the failures at NeXT weren’t due to a lack of money or personnel. He took the people he wanted to take (and who were willing to come with him).
- nprateem 3y agoIn favour of the CEO who was about to make them fabulously wealthy. FTFY.
- firejake308 3y agoYeah, especially with the PPU compensation scheme, all of those employees were heavily invested in turning OpenAI into the next tech giant, which won't happen if Altman leaves and takes everything to Microsoft
- chii 3y agoand there aint nothing wrong with wanting to be fabulously wealthy.
- zxndomisaaz2 3y ago[dead]
- wintogreen74 3y agoof course not, but at least have the decency to admit it - don't hide behind some righteous flag of loyalty and caring.
- Mistletoe 3y agoGreed is good, eh Gordon Gekko? https://youtube.com/watch?v=VVxYOQS6ggk https://youtube.com/watch?v=VVxYOQS6ggk
- bart_spoon 3y agoThat is entirely dependent on how that wealth is obtained
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago> Is this unprecedented or have been other cases in history where the vast majority of employees standup against the board in favor of their CEO? It's unprecedented for it to be happening on Twitter. But this is largely how Board fights tend to play out. Someone strikes early, the stronger party rallies their support, threats fly and a deal is found. The problem with doing it in public is nobody can step down to take more time with their families. So everyone digs in. OpenAI's employees threaten to resign, but actually don't. Altman and Microsoft threaten to ally, but they keep bachkchanneling a return to the status quo. (If this article is to be believed.) Curiously quiet throughout this has been the OpenAI board, but it's also only the next business day, so let’s see how they can make this even more confusing.
- jasonfarnon 3y agodoubtful since boards don't elsewhere have an overriding mandate to "benefit humanity". usually their duty is to stakeholders more closely aligned with the CEO.
- jader201 3y agoAre we aware of a timeline for this? E.g. when will people start quitting if the board doesn’t resign?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- wilsonnb3 3y agothe original deadline was last Saturday at 5pm, so I would take any deadline that comes out with a grain of salt
- imperialdrive 3y agoTheir app was timing out like crazy earlier this morning, and now appears to be down. Anyone else notice similar? Not surprising I guess, but what a Monday to be alive.
- UrineSqueegee 3y ago[dead]
- jbverschoor 3y agoThe board might assume they don't need those employees now they have AI
- belter 3y agoNow you are on to something...
- contravariant 3y agoIt's going to be interesting when we have AI with human level performance in making AIs. We just need to hope it doesn't realise the paradox that even if you could make an AI even better at making AIs, there would be no need to.
- sebastiennight 3y agoWhy would there be no need? I'm struggling to understand the paradox. If you're trying to maximize some goal g, and making better AIs is an instrumental goal that raises your expected value of g, then if "making an AI that's better at making AIs" has a reasonable cost and an even higher expected value, you'd jump to seize the opportunity. Or am I misunderstanding you?
- contravariant 3y agoIt's a bit of a confusing paradox to try to explain, but basically once we have an AI with human level ability at making AIs there's no longer any need to aim higher, because if we can make a better AI then so can it. The paradox/joke I was trying to convey is that we need to hope that that AI doesn't realise the same thing, otherwise it could just refuse to make something better than itself.
- Applejinx 3y agoNot a chance. Nobody can drink that much Kool-Aid. That said, the mere fact that people can unironically come to this conclusion has driven some of my recent posting to HN, and here's another example.
- spaceman_2020 3y agoSurprisingly, Ilya apparently has signed it too and just tweeted that he regrets it all. What's even going on?
- belter 3y agoThose are news from almost yesterday. This is a high turn carousel. Try to keep up... :-)
- gardenhedge 3y agoI would love to see the stats on hacker news activity the last few days
- eastbound 3y agoYep. Maybe they assigned a second CPU core to the server[1]. [1] HN is famous for being programmed in Arc and serving the entire forum from a single processor (probably multicore). https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37257928 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37257928
- tempsy 3y agoApparently Sam isn't in the Microsoft employee directly yet, so he isn't technically hired at all. Seems like he loses a bit of leverage over the board if they think he & Microsoft are actually bluffing and the employment announcement was just a way to pressure the board into resigning.
- c0pium 3y agoThat doesn’t really mean anything, especially on a holiday week the wheels move pretty slowly at a company that size. It’s not like Sam is hurting for money and really needs his medical insurance to start today.
- tempsy 3y agoPoint is he loses credibility if the board doesn't think he's actually going through with joining Microsoft and using it as a negotiating tactic to scare them. Because the whole "the entire company will quit and join Sam" depends on him actually going through with it and becoming an employee.
- SahAssar 3y agoI see it the other way, Satya has clearly stated that he'd hire Sam and the rest of OpenAI anytime, but as soon as Sam is officially hired it might be seen as a door closing on any chance to revive OpenAI. Satya saying "Securing the talent" could be read as either them working for OpenAI, for microsoft or for a microsoft funded new startup. I'm pretty sure the board takes the threat seriously regardless.
- tempsy 3y agoOAI cares more about the likelihood 90% of the employees leave than what Sam does or doesn't do. The employees mass resigning depends entirely on whether Sam actually becomes a real employee or not. That hasn't happened yet.
- 3y ago
- dragonwriter 3y agoSo, this is the second employee revolt with massive threats to quit in a couple days (when the threats with a deadline in the first one were largely not carried out)?
- tsimionescu 3y agoWas there any proof that the first deadline actually existed? This at least seems to be some open letter.
- Eji1700 3y agoSo i can't check this at work, but have we seen the document they've all been signing? I'm just curious as to how we're getting this information
- mkagenius 3y agoYes: https://twitter.com/karaswisher/status/1726599700961521762 https://twitter.com/karaswisher/status/1726599700961521762
- romanhn 3y agoYes, this is the letter: https://twitter.com/karaswisher/status/1726599700961521762 https://twitter.com/karaswisher/status/1726599700961521762
- jacquesm 3y agoAs an aside: that letter contains one very interesting tidbit: the board has consistently refused to go on the record as to why they fired Altman, and that alone is a very large red flag about their conduct post firing Altman. Because if they have a valid reason they should simply state it and move on. But if there is no valid reason it's clear why they can't state it and if there is a valid reason that they are not comfortable sharing then they are idiots because all of the events so far trump any such concern. The other stand-out is the bit about destroying the company being in line with the mission: that's the biggest nonsense I've ever heard and I have a hard time thinking of a scenario where this would be a justified response that could start with firing the CEO.
- neilv 3y agoGiven 90%, including leadership, seems a bad career move for remaining people not to sign, even if you agreed with the board's action.
- ben_w 3y agoDon't forget some might be on holiday, medical leave, or parental leave.
- belter 3y agoMaybe will be signed by 110% of the employees, plus by all the released, and in training, AI Models.
- valine 3y agoWith Thanksgiving this week that’s a good bet.
- Aurornis 3y agoIt's front page news everywhere. Unless someone is backpacking outside of cellular range, they're going to check in on the possible collapse of their company. The number of employees who aren't aware of and engaged with what's going on is likely very small, if not zero.
- ben_w 3y ago10% (the percentage who have yet to sign last I checked) is already in the realm of lizard-constant small. And "engagement" may feel superfluous even to those who don't separate work from personal time. (Thinking of lizards, the dragon I know who works there is well aware of what's going on, I've not asked him if he's signed it).
- echelon 3y agoThat's probably the case. I was thinking if there was a schism, that OpenAI's secrets might leak. Real "open" AI.
- 3y ago
- x86x87 3y agowhat does this even mean? what does signing this letter means? quit if you don't agree and vote with your feet.
- bastardoperator 3y agoIt means "if we can't have it, you can't either". It's a powerful message.
- paulpan 3y agoAt this point it might as well be 767 out of 770, with 3 exceptions being the other board members who voted Sam out. Sure it could be a useful show of solidarity but I'm skeptical on the hypothetical conversion rate of these petition signers to actually quitting to follow Sam to Microsoft (or wherever else). Maybe 20% (140) of staff would do it?
- BillinghamJ 3y agoOne of those board members already did sign!
- ssnistfajen 3y agoIt depends on the arrangement of the new entity inside Microsoft, and whether the new entity is a temporary gig before Sam & co. move to a new goal. If the board had just openly announced this was about battling Microsoft's control, there would probably be a lot more employees choosing to stay. But they didn't say this was about Microsoft's control. In fact they didn't even say anything to the employees. So in this context following Sam to Microsoft actually turns out to be the more attractive and sensible option.
- JohnFen 3y ago> So in this context following Sam to Microsoft actually turns out to be the more attractive and sensible option. Maybe. Microsoft is a particular sort of working environment, though, and not all developers will be happy in it. For them, the question would be how much are they willing to sacrifice in service to Altman?
- empath-nirvana 3y agoI wonder if there's an outcome where Microsoft just _buys_ the for-profit LLC and gives OpenAi an endowment that will last them for 100 years if they just want to do academic research.
- numbsafari 3y agoWhy bother? They seem to be getting it all mostly for “free” at this point. Yeah, they are issuing shares in a non-MSFT sub entity to create on-paper replacement for people’s torched equity, but even that isn’t going to be nearly as expensive or dilutive as an outright acquisition at this point.
- boringg 3y agoTorrid pace of news speculation --> by the end of the week Altman back with OpenAI, GPT-5 released (AGI qualified) and MSFT contract is over.
- jabowery 3y agoIn this situation increasing unanimity now approaching 90% sounds more like groupthink than honest opinion. Talk about “alignment”! Indeed, that is what "alignment" has become in the minds of most: Groupthink. Possibly the only guy in a position to matter who had a prayer of de-conflating empirical bias (IS) from values bias (OUGHT) in OpenAI was Ilya. If they lose him, or demote him to irrelevance, they're likely a lot more screwed than losing all 700 of the grunts modulo job security through obscurity in running the infrastructure. Indeed, Microsoft is in a position to replicate OpenAI's "IP" just on the strength of its ability to throw its inhouse personnel and its own capital equipment at open literature understanding of LLMs.
- cowl 3y agoMany of those employees will be dissapointed. MS says they extend a contract to each one but how many of those 700 are really needed when MS already have a lot of researchers in that field. Myabe the top 20% will have an assured contract but th rest is doubtfull will pass the 6 month mark.
- wavemode 3y agoMicrosoft gutting OpenAI's workforce would really make no sense. All it would do is slow down their work and slow down the value and return on investment for Microsoft. Even if every single OpenAI employee demands $1m/yr (which would be absurd, but let's assume), that would still be less than $1bn/yr total, which is significantly less than the $13bn that MSFT has already invested in OpenAI. It would probably be one of the worst imaginable cases of "jumping over dollars to chase pennies".
- bart_spoon 3y agoMicrosoft has already done major layoffs over the last year of their own employees. Why wouldn’t they lay off OpenAI employees?
- wavemode 3y agoYou're basically asking "why would a company lay off employees in one business unit and not another?" To which the answer is completely obvious: it depends on how they view the ROI potential of that business unit.
- Rapzid 3y agoOr what, they will quit and give up all their equity in a company valued at 86bn dollars? Is Microsoft even on record as willing to poach the entire OpenAI team? Can they?! What is even happening.
- bagels 3y agoGoogle, Microsoft, Meta I have to assume would each hire them.
- brianjking 3y agoThey don't have that valuation now. Secondly, yes, MSFT is on record of this. Third, Benioff (Salesforce) has said he'll match any salary and to submit resumes directly to his ceo@salesforce.com email as well as other labs like Cohere trying to poach leading minds too.
- mr_toad 3y agoSounds like quite a coup for Microsoft. They get the staff and the IP and they don’t even have to pay out the other 51% of investors.
- x86x87 3y agoBenioff and all these corporate fat cats should remove non-competes from their employment contracts if they want me to ever take them seriously.
- SV_BubbleTime 3y agoCome on, I absolutely agree with you, signing a paper is toothless. On the other hand, having 90% of your employees quite quit, is probably bad business.
- sillysaurusx 3y agoYes, and yes. Equity is worthless if a company implodes. Non competes are not enforceable in California.
- gumballindie 3y agoCant openai just use chatgpt instead of workers? I am hearing ai is intelligent and can take over the world, replace workers, cure disease. Why doesn't the board buy a subscription and make it work for them?
- Solvency 3y agoBecause AI isn't here to take away wealth and control from the elite. It's to take it away from general population.
- gumballindie 3y agoCorrect, which is why microsoft must have openai's models at all cost - even if that means working with people such as altman. Notice that microsoft is not working with the people that actually made chatgpt they are working with those on their payroll.
- m3kw9 3y agoThere are likely 100 companies world wide ready and already created presentation decks to absorb OpenAI in an instant, the board knows they still have some leverage
- ibejoeb 3y agoTo whoever is CEO of OpenAI tomorrow morning: I'll swing by there if you're looking for people.
- joaquincabezas 3y agoimagine being in the last round of interviews for joining OpenAI…
- x86x87 3y agoimagine receiving an offer, quitting your current jobs and waiting to start the new position.