16 ms·
Given 90%, including leadership, seems a bad career move for remaining people not to sign, even if you agreed with the board's action.
by neilv 3y ago
Given 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.
- websap 3y agoFolks in Silicon Valley don’t travel without their laptop
- whycome 3y agoOn a digital-detox trip to Patagonia. Return to this in 5 days
- ssgodderidge 3y ago"Hey everyone ... what did I miss?"
- jacquesm 3y agoThat would be one very rude awakening, probably to the point where you initially would think you're being pranked.
- ben_w 3y agoI feel pranked despite having multiple independent websites confirming the story without a single one giving me an SSL certificate warning.
- jacquesm 3y agoCan't blame you. And I suspect the story is far from over, and that it may well get a lot weirder still.
- fuzzfactor 3y agoSeems to me that sama and Microsoft have been on fairly equal footing since the 49:51 % deal was made. Then a seismic shift underneath Sam but Microsoft has enough stability and resources to more than compensate for the part of the 51% that was already in OpenAI's hands, which might not be under Sam's purview any more if he is kicked out. But then again it might be Sam's leadership which would still effectively be in place from a position at Microsoft anyway, or it might end up making more sense for him to also be in a position at OpenAI, maybe even at the same time, in order to make the most of their previous investment. Kicking out Sam was obviously an emotional decision, not anything like a business decision. Then again OpenAI is not supposed to be an actual business. I don't think that should be an excuse for an unwise or destructive decision. It was not an overnight development, even though it took Sam by surprise. When I see this: >the board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI I understand that to mean that the board was not behind him 100% for quite some time, but were fine with him going forward believing otherwise. Some uncandidness does seem to have taken place and there may or may not have been anything Sam could have done about it. This was simmering for a while and it will require more than one weekend for everyone involved to regroup. Which is what they're doing now, observers can see a whirlwind, actual participants really have something on their plate. Some things will have to be unraveled and other things weaved from the key ingredients, I would say it's really up to Sam and Microsoft to hash this out so it's still some kind of something like an equal deal among them. Regardless of which employer(s) Sam may end up serving in leadership positions, and the bulk of the staff will be behind Sam in a way the OpenAI board was not, so the employees will be just as well off regardless of the final structure. This was quite a hasty upset but deserves a careful somewhat gradual resolution.
- evantbyrne 3y ago[flagged]
- nullindividual 3y agoI'm no fan of rich people as a principle given they suck wealth from the poor and Smaug the money away like the narcissists they are, but this is the definition of that horrible cancel culture. She's accused him which isn't something the public should act upon. If proven, then it's appropriate to form that negative opinion.
- rlt 3y agoI was told we’re supposed to #BelieveAllWomen.
- MrNeon 3y agoName one Smaug-like rich person that is just sitting on massive amounts of wealth.
- evantbyrne 3y agoIt's not "cancel culture" to ask that your leaders address salacious allegations brought against them by their own family. The question of his firing is way less serious from a ethical standpoint, and yet this is what OpenAI employees are willing to stick their necks out for? That is some telling prioritization.
- bertil 3y agoSomeone mentioned the plight of people with conditional work visas. I'm not sure how they could handle that.
- hotnfresh 3y agoI think the board did the right thing, just waaaay too late for it to be effective. They’d been cut out long ago and just hadn’t realized it yet. … but I’d probably sign for exactly those good-career-move reasons, at this point. Going down with the ship isn’t even going to be noticed, let alone change anything.
- jacquesm 3y agoDo you know their motivations? Because that is the main question everybody has: why did they do it?
- hotnfresh 3y agoI guess I should rephrase that as if they did it because they perceived that Altman was maneuvering to be untouchable within the company and moving against the interests of the nonprofit, they did the right thing. Just, again, way too late because it seems he was already untouchable.
- jacquesm 3y agoAccording to the letter they consistently refused to go on the record why they did it and that would be as good a reason as any so then they should make it public. I'm leaning towards there not being a good reason that doesn't expose the board to immediate liability. And that's why they're keeping mum.
- kmlevitt 3y agoThat might also explain why they don’t back down and reinstate him. If they double down with this and it goes to court, they can argue that they were legitimately acting in what they thought was openAI’s best interests. Even if their reasoning looks stupid, they would still have plausible deniability in terms of a difference of opinion/philosophical approach on how to handle AI, etc. But if they reinstate him it’s basically an admission that they didn’t know what they were doing in the first place and were incompetent. Part of the negotiations for reinstating him involved a demand from Sam that they release a statement absolving him of any criminal wrongdoing, etc., And they refused because that would expose them to liability too.
- mrandish 3y agoI'm waiting for Emmett Shear, the new iCEO the outside board hired last night, to try to sign the employee letter. That MSFT signing bonus might be pretty sweet! :-)
- gigglesupstairs 3y agoHaha that would be cute. This whole affair is so Sorkinist.
- ChumpGPT 3y agoHow do you know the remaining people aren't there because of some of the board members? Perhaps there is loyalty in the equation.
- ideamotor 3y agoBingo. The fact they all felt compelled to sign this could just as easily be a sign the board made the right decision, as the opposite.
- epolanski 3y agoSome people value their integrity and build a career on that. Not everything has to be done poorly.