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Small amount of residual consequences? The employees are asking for the board to resign. So their jobs are literally on the line. That's not really a small cons

Small amount of residual consequences? The employees are asking for the board to resign. So their jobs are literally on the line. That's not really a small consequence for most people.

KeplerBoy 3y ago
Their board positions are gone either way. If they stay OpenAI is done.
- cableshaft 3y ago
  I do think that's almost certainly going to happen. But they're probably still trying to find the one scenario (out of 16 million possibilities, like Dr. Strange in Endgame) that allows them to keep their power or at least give them a nice golden parachute. Hence why they're not just immediately flipping the undo switch.
jacquesm 3y ago
They are utterly delusional if they think they will be board members of OpenAI in the future unless they plan to ride it down the drain and if they do that they are in very, very hot water.
- Davidzheng 3y ago
  Do they face any real consequences?
  - ar_lan 3y ago
    Lost money. Same consequence either way, so there is no incentive for them to leave.
    - Davidzheng 3y ago
      They don't have equity in openai though right. You mean from reputation loss?
      - jacquesm 3y ago
        For starters about 700 employees seem to think their livelihood matters and that the board didn't exercise their duty of care towards them.
        JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > about 700 employees seem to think their livelihood matters and that the board didn't exercise their duty of care towards them It is difficult to see how such a duty would arise. OpenAI is a non-profit. The company's duty was to the non-profit. The non-profit doesn't have one to the company's employees; its job was literally to check them.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        To check them does not overlap with 'to destroy them at the first opportunity'. There is no way that this board decision - which now is only supported by three of the original nine board members - is going to survive absent a very clear and unambiguous reason that shows that their only remedy was to fire the CEO. This sort of thing you don't do by your gut feeling, you go by the book.
        JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > no way that this board decision...is going to survive absent a very clear and unambiguous reason that shows that their only remedy was to fire the CEO The simplest explanation is Altman said he wasn't going to do something and then did it. At that point, even a corporate board would have cause for termination. Of course, the devil is in the details, and I doubt we'll have any of them this week. But more incredulous than the board's decision is the claim that it owes any duty to its for-profit subsidiary's employees, who aren't even shareholders, but some profit-sharing paper's holders.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    Good question. Potentially: Liability based on their decisions. If it turns out those were not ultimately motivated by actual concern for the good of the company then they have a lot of problems.
    - Schiendelman 3y ago
      It’s not a company - which is why they’re able to do this. We’ve just learned, again, that nonprofits can’t make these kinds of decisions because the checks and balances that investors and a profit motive create don’t exist.
      - jacquesm 3y ago
        That doesn't matter. Even the members of the board of a non-profit are liable for all of the fall-out from their decisions if those decisions end up not being defensible. That's pretty much written in stone and one of the reasons why you should never accept a board seat out of your competence.
      - munificent 3y ago
        > the checks and balances that investors and a profit motive create https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_industrial_disasters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_industrial_disasters
    - dragonwriter 3y ago
      > If it turns out those were not ultimately motivated by actual concern for the good of the company then they have a lot of problems. The boards duty is to to the charitable mission, not any other concept of the “good of the company”, and other than the government if they are doing something like pursuing their own private profit interest or acting as an agent for someone elses or some other specific public wrongs, the people able to make a claim are pretty narrow, because OpenAI isn't membership-based charity in which there are members to whom the board is accountable for pursuit of the mission. People keep acting like the parent organization here is a normal corporation, and its not, and even the for-profit subsidiary had an operating agreement subordinating other interests to the charitable mission of the parent organization.
  - paulddraper 3y ago
    Reputation/shame is a real consequence. Granted, much of the harm is already done, but it can get worse.
bertil 3y ago
Board positions are not full-time jobs, at least not usually.

Small amount of residual consequences? The employees are asking for the board to resign. So their jobs are literally on the line. That's not really a small consequence for most people.

KeplerBoy 3y ago

Their board positions are gone either way. If they stay OpenAI is done.

cableshaft 3y ago
I do think that's almost certainly going to happen. But they're probably still trying to find the one scenario (out of 16 million possibilities, like Dr. Strange in Endgame) that allows them to keep their power or at least give them a nice golden parachute. Hence why they're not just immediately flipping the undo switch.

jacquesm 3y ago

They are utterly delusional if they think they will be board members of OpenAI in the future unless they plan to ride it down the drain and if they do that they are in very, very hot water.

Davidzheng 3y ago
Do they face any real consequences?
- ar_lan 3y ago
  Lost money. Same consequence either way, so there is no incentive for them to leave.
  - Davidzheng 3y ago
    They don't have equity in openai though right. You mean from reputation loss?
    - jacquesm 3y ago
      For starters about 700 employees seem to think their livelihood matters and that the board didn't exercise their duty of care towards them.
      - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > about 700 employees seem to think their livelihood matters and that the board didn't exercise their duty of care towards them It is difficult to see how such a duty would arise. OpenAI is a non-profit. The company's duty was to the non-profit. The non-profit doesn't have one to the company's employees; its job was literally to check them.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        To check them does not overlap with 'to destroy them at the first opportunity'. There is no way that this board decision - which now is only supported by three of the original nine board members - is going to survive absent a very clear and unambiguous reason that shows that their only remedy was to fire the CEO. This sort of thing you don't do by your gut feeling, you go by the book.
        JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > no way that this board decision...is going to survive absent a very clear and unambiguous reason that shows that their only remedy was to fire the CEO The simplest explanation is Altman said he wasn't going to do something and then did it. At that point, even a corporate board would have cause for termination. Of course, the devil is in the details, and I doubt we'll have any of them this week. But more incredulous than the board's decision is the claim that it owes any duty to its for-profit subsidiary's employees, who aren't even shareholders, but some profit-sharing paper's holders.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  Good question. Potentially: Liability based on their decisions. If it turns out those were not ultimately motivated by actual concern for the good of the company then they have a lot of problems.
  - Schiendelman 3y ago
    It’s not a company - which is why they’re able to do this. We’ve just learned, again, that nonprofits can’t make these kinds of decisions because the checks and balances that investors and a profit motive create don’t exist.
    - jacquesm 3y ago
      That doesn't matter. Even the members of the board of a non-profit are liable for all of the fall-out from their decisions if those decisions end up not being defensible. That's pretty much written in stone and one of the reasons why you should never accept a board seat out of your competence.
    - munificent 3y ago
      > the checks and balances that investors and a profit motive create https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_industrial_disasters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_industrial_disasters
  - dragonwriter 3y ago
    > If it turns out those were not ultimately motivated by actual concern for the good of the company then they have a lot of problems. The boards duty is to to the charitable mission, not any other concept of the “good of the company”, and other than the government if they are doing something like pursuing their own private profit interest or acting as an agent for someone elses or some other specific public wrongs, the people able to make a claim are pretty narrow, because OpenAI isn't membership-based charity in which there are members to whom the board is accountable for pursuit of the mission. People keep acting like the parent organization here is a normal corporation, and its not, and even the for-profit subsidiary had an operating agreement subordinating other interests to the charitable mission of the parent organization.
- paulddraper 3y ago
  Reputation/shame is a real consequence. Granted, much of the harm is already done, but it can get worse.

bertil 3y ago

Board positions are not full-time jobs, at least not usually.