7 ms·

I think there is a very good chance this is true, but it also paints the picture of the board being incompetent and incapable of confrontation. They could have

by Aunche 2y ago

I think there is a very good chance this is true, but it also paints the picture of the board being incompetent and incapable of confrontation. They could have filed formal complaints, mandated increased scrutiny, handed off Sam's responsibilities to other people, or threatened legal action. Instead, they attempted a secret coup, which of course makes Sam look like the underdog

_giorgio_ 2y ago
Obviously. They were just waiting for an excuse to fire him, and by chance they accused him of the same "errors" the had him fired before.
pdonis 2y ago
> it also paints the picture of the board being incompetent and incapable of confrontation Yes. Nobody involved in this comes out looking very good IMO.
- dylan604 2y ago
  Rarely does anyone in situations like this have no fault. It's all degrees of wrong really
akozak 2y ago
I've seen the "coup" framing a lot I just don't see how that's justified. They're the board of directors! Hiring and firing the CEO is core to the job (as is maintaining mission alignment, in the nonprofit world).
- HDThoreaun 2y ago
  Vince Mcmahon literally owns WWE but the board fired him. Of course he voted in a new board at the next election but I dont think it's unheard of boards to vote against their founders. Sam is a founder of openAI even if he never controlled the board, and they tried to take control from him.
  - mark212 2y ago
    Bad analogy. Sam has no stock in OpenAI or any sort of formal controlling interest. His power is solely informal: his own talents and abilities and the loyalty of the other employees. Regardless of the truth of the matters, the episode is a perfect example of the limits of formal authority and how informal or "soft" power can be even more effective in shaping events
    - strunz 2y ago
      Did you read the article which points out specifically that he is financially incentivized?
      - mbonnet 2y ago
        Only in the innovation fund thing, not the company at large (going solely off the article)
    - HDThoreaun 2y ago
      The point is that board coups are a concept that people are already familiar with, so its not surprising that they thought of it when this similar situation happened.
- fastball 2y ago
  I think the "coup" framing is supported at least by Helen Toner's claims in this article. > "We were very careful, very deliberate about who we told, which was essentially almost no one in advance, other than obviously our legal team and so that's kind of what took us to to November 17." If that doesn't sound like a secret coup, I don't know what does. Like, yes, it is their job to hire and fire the CEO so it's not really a coup, but when you do your "job" in secret instead of in the open that's the vibe you give off.
  - lamename 2y ago
    Employees are quite often given no notice of firing or layoff, despite it being discussed by managers or executives ahead of time without the employee present. Is a Board firing the CEO typically conducted differently?
  - fnordpiglet 2y ago
    When a board is about to fire a CEO do you think they typically discuss it publicly first? It’s usually treated as highly sensitive information at every company. Likewise if any company is about to fire anyone they also don’t typically advertise this to anyone other than HR, legal, and maybe the manager. For the CEO the manager -is- the board. I’d be curious if you believe differently how you feel boards usually advertise such an action?
    - fastball 2y ago
      Who said publicly? There is a lot of room between "discuss publicly" and "We were very careful, very deliberate about who we told, which was essentially almost no one in advance". For example, a lot of the pressure that caused them to reverse course came from Microsoft. Maybe if the board had discussed such a big decision without OpenAI's biggest investor, Microsoft would've been on board with the firing.
      - insane_dreamer 2y ago
        Who would they be telling? Board members don’t and shouldn’t discuss matters with employees. Please show me the case where employees were told in advance that the board was going to fire the CEO.
- Aunche 2y ago
  It's very unusual to vote to fire a CEO without all members being present. Doing so made it seem like they were stabbing him in the back
  - dragonwriter 2y ago
    > It's very unusual to vote to fire a CEO without all members being present. It's not unusual to exclude people with conflicts from a decision. That's a typical part of a corporate conflict of interest policy, and for a charity nonprofit board (as the OpenAI board is) it's even more critical, since failute to do so risks the tax-exempt status.
- datavirtue 2y ago
  I have witnessed at least one board that was made up of friends of the founder. A doe-eyed rubber stamp brigade. This was enough to fool some serious investors into parking their money there. Of course, they eventually realized what was going on and launched an all out offensive to affect change. (They didn't get anywhere despite owning 15%.) I know this because the investors published a website where they detailed the situation.
- tivert 2y ago
  > I've seen the "coup" framing a lot I just don't see how that's justified. They're the board of directors! Hiring and firing the CEO is core to the job (as is maintaining mission alignment, in the nonprofit world). It isn't justified, it's just misleading propaganda. Unfortunately through repetition and the enthusiasms of various fandoms, it's gotten lodged in the public mind.
preommr 2y ago
What would be the point of having him as CEO if they mistrusted him so much that they would have to put a metaphorical straightjacket on him to make sure he behaved well? Not to mention that if he was vengeful, it would be much easier to do damage from within and from a position of power.
- xwolfi 2y ago
  Sir, let me introduce you to Elon Musk, whose board chairman talk of like a little child you need to please with candies so he can bullshit well at earnings to pump the stock. Joke aside, the CEO can be a promoter of hype with no particular management skills - if the shareholders, via the board, are happy with that, their money their risks.
rst 2y ago
"Filed a formal complaint" with whom? The board itself is the final authority, empowered to investigate and act. If its members have concerns, they either do something or don't. There's nowhere else to pass the buck.
- Aunche 2y ago
  > "Filed a formal complaint" with whom? For their own records. They can use it for justification for disciplinary action or legal ammunition. It is always useful to document things in writing. It's the same reason why companies will put you on PIP.
  - cdchn 2y ago
    Lie to your boss and see if they put you on a pip "Please improve your inability to tell the truth."
  - florean 2y ago
    Why would you think this stuff wasn't in writing? Do you think the investigation OAI did into the board's actions was just relayed orally?[1] That the board's discussions where all done in conference calls and not in e-mail? Do you think that this documentation gets routinely released to the public or even employees? Before you throw around accusations of incompetence, you should probably have some shred of evidence. This is the type of stuff that is typically considered extremely confidential and even now they say they are unable to reveal details. Why do you think that is? What is preventing them from doing something they apparently want to? Legal agreements such as NDAs, the same ones that would have prevented them from going public with details last years. The board's mistake was not figuring out a way to go public with their case against Sam when or before they fired him. They obviously misjudged how he would respond. But even there we don't know the full context and constraints they were under. Hopefully, one of them will answer that question of why they didn't at some point, but until we know more, we would be wise to reserve judgement. [1] https://archive.is/wbwC2 https://archive.is/wbwC2
    - Aunche 2y ago
refulgentis 2y ago
This doesn't make any sense, it's attempting to carve out imaginary middle ground where there is none. Who reviews the "formal complaints" a director files about a CEO? Where have you ever worked that HR takes "formal complaints" about vaguely unethical behavior seriously? You want to pretend it was some huge surprise delivered to Sam without warning, for power's sake, because then there is middle ground. That wasn't the case.
tbrownaw 2y ago
I believe the standard advice for dealing with abusive people in personal relationships is to GTFO. Because it's generally unrealistic to think they can be fixed. Does the same reasoning not apply to supposed-to-be-trusting business relationships?
hn_throwaway_99 2y ago
> They could have filed formal complaints, mandated increased scrutiny, handed off Sam's responsibilities to other people, or threatened legal action. I think you fundamentally misunderstand the role of the board of directors. It's often been said that the board (of any company) has basically one job: to hire (and fire) the CEO. While that may be a slight exaggeration, the wisdom behind that quote is that things turn out badly when the board meddles in decisions of a company's executive leadership - if they don't like the decisions being made, they should replace the CEO, and that's where their power lies. You talk about "filing formal complaints" - what does this even mean?? They're the board, who else would they file formal complaints to? "Hand off Sam's responsibilities to other people"?? Again, any corporate governance expert would say that's a recipe for disaster, never mind not even feasible the way corporate hierarchies work. I've commented many times before that I think the way the board handled the Altman's filing was, at best, woefully naive, and their communication at the time (even after he was fired) abysmal. But neither do I think it was some sort of "coup", and your recommendations simply don't make sense.
- GeorgeTirebiter 2y ago
  This precisely correct. The board hires & fires the CEO. End of story. When the board is unhappy how the company is being run, their recourse is to...fire the CEO. What is unusual here is the wellspring of support from "the troops", such that if they stuck with their firing the CEO, there would be hardly any company left to be BoD of! The board didn't understand the depth of employee allegiance to sama.
  - jprete 2y ago
    I saw a claim at the time that a handful of employees rallied everyone else to sign the letter and post support on Twitter. Between that and Altman reportedly having a vindictive streak, I'm thinking the actual employee support was paper-thin.
    - Rastonbury 2y ago
      Prisoner's dilemma and/or social pressure when million in profit share units hang in the balance. Joining MS was a way to stop their compensation being at risk by being stuck on a sinking ship
whimsicalism 2y ago
nah the issue was that they pay employees in PPU which is tied to Sam Altman's ability to raise capital, not to the board. the board effectively did not control the pay of its employees, whereas Sam did
surfingdino 2y ago
Ignoring for a moment the board's responsibilities and ability to implement the measures you suggest, read what you wrote again and think of it from the practical point of view. If you had a person that needed all that oversight would it not be cheaper and more practical to replace him?
MrSkelter 2y ago
The board is working with the assumption the CEO isn’t a liar. Altman is a classic sociopath, a T-1000 to Musk’s clunky T-800. OpenAI is fated to implode in scandal. His 7 trillion dollar funding round ambition is a blaring siren to anyone with a working brain that he’s out of control and capable of doing real damage. He wants a sum of money that could crash the world economy. He thinks he should have the power of the world’s most powerful government. Solely dictated by his whim. He makes Napoleon and Hitler look like pikers. He is Musk in 2016, when some of us knew who he was, and the fans were still enthralled. You will look back and say “No one knew” and this comment will be there. We knew. Musk will end up the Bush to his Trump. We will fondly recall the crimes of a guy who just wasn’t as bad as what followed. Why do you think Musk hates him so much? He’s a better Musk than Musk. He’s the guy who took OpenAI out from under him. It’s envy.
- admissionsguy 2y ago
  Just to be clear - Musk’s crimes are single-handedly turning the US into the leader in EV and space industries, calling one guy a „pedo” and standing trial for it, and supporting the political side that you don’t like?
  - bookaway 2y ago
    > calling one guy a „pedo” Yes, and just to be clear -- That one guy was a diver who put his life at risk to save trapped children from an underwater cave, a rescue operation in the span of which a Thai Navy Seal actually died. Furthermore, Musk went on record stating that he had took a further step of hiring a private investigator to dig up dirt on the guy, not before he called the guy a pedo, but after when the reality of getting sued began to sink in.
    - tim333 2y ago
      And a guy who insulted Musk first.
      - frankzinger 2y ago

by Aunche 2y ago

_giorgio_ 2y ago

Obviously. They were just waiting for an excuse to fire him, and by chance they accused him of the same "errors" the had him fired before.

pdonis 2y ago

> it also paints the picture of the board being incompetent and incapable of confrontation Yes. Nobody involved in this comes out looking very good IMO.

dylan604 2y ago
Rarely does anyone in situations like this have no fault. It's all degrees of wrong really

akozak 2y ago

I've seen the "coup" framing a lot I just don't see how that's justified. They're the board of directors! Hiring and firing the CEO is core to the job (as is maintaining mission alignment, in the nonprofit world).

HDThoreaun 2y ago
Vince Mcmahon literally owns WWE but the board fired him. Of course he voted in a new board at the next election but I dont think it's unheard of boards to vote against their founders. Sam is a founder of openAI even if he never controlled the board, and they tried to take control from him.
- mark212 2y ago
  Bad analogy. Sam has no stock in OpenAI or any sort of formal controlling interest. His power is solely informal: his own talents and abilities and the loyalty of the other employees. Regardless of the truth of the matters, the episode is a perfect example of the limits of formal authority and how informal or "soft" power can be even more effective in shaping events
  - strunz 2y ago
    Did you read the article which points out specifically that he is financially incentivized?
    - mbonnet 2y ago
      Only in the innovation fund thing, not the company at large (going solely off the article)
  - HDThoreaun 2y ago
    The point is that board coups are a concept that people are already familiar with, so its not surprising that they thought of it when this similar situation happened.
fastball 2y ago
I think the "coup" framing is supported at least by Helen Toner's claims in this article. > "We were very careful, very deliberate about who we told, which was essentially almost no one in advance, other than obviously our legal team and so that's kind of what took us to to November 17." If that doesn't sound like a secret coup, I don't know what does. Like, yes, it is their job to hire and fire the CEO so it's not really a coup, but when you do your "job" in secret instead of in the open that's the vibe you give off.
- lamename 2y ago
  Employees are quite often given no notice of firing or layoff, despite it being discussed by managers or executives ahead of time without the employee present. Is a Board firing the CEO typically conducted differently?
- fnordpiglet 2y ago
  When a board is about to fire a CEO do you think they typically discuss it publicly first? It’s usually treated as highly sensitive information at every company. Likewise if any company is about to fire anyone they also don’t typically advertise this to anyone other than HR, legal, and maybe the manager. For the CEO the manager -is- the board. I’d be curious if you believe differently how you feel boards usually advertise such an action?
  - fastball 2y ago
    Who said publicly? There is a lot of room between "discuss publicly" and "We were very careful, very deliberate about who we told, which was essentially almost no one in advance". For example, a lot of the pressure that caused them to reverse course came from Microsoft. Maybe if the board had discussed such a big decision without OpenAI's biggest investor, Microsoft would've been on board with the firing.
    - insane_dreamer 2y ago
      Who would they be telling? Board members don’t and shouldn’t discuss matters with employees. Please show me the case where employees were told in advance that the board was going to fire the CEO.
Aunche 2y ago
It's very unusual to vote to fire a CEO without all members being present. Doing so made it seem like they were stabbing him in the back
- dragonwriter 2y ago
  > It's very unusual to vote to fire a CEO without all members being present. It's not unusual to exclude people with conflicts from a decision. That's a typical part of a corporate conflict of interest policy, and for a charity nonprofit board (as the OpenAI board is) it's even more critical, since failute to do so risks the tax-exempt status.
datavirtue 2y ago
I have witnessed at least one board that was made up of friends of the founder. A doe-eyed rubber stamp brigade. This was enough to fool some serious investors into parking their money there. Of course, they eventually realized what was going on and launched an all out offensive to affect change. (They didn't get anywhere despite owning 15%.) I know this because the investors published a website where they detailed the situation.
tivert 2y ago
> I've seen the "coup" framing a lot I just don't see how that's justified. They're the board of directors! Hiring and firing the CEO is core to the job (as is maintaining mission alignment, in the nonprofit world). It isn't justified, it's just misleading propaganda. Unfortunately through repetition and the enthusiasms of various fandoms, it's gotten lodged in the public mind.

preommr 2y ago

What would be the point of having him as CEO if they mistrusted him so much that they would have to put a metaphorical straightjacket on him to make sure he behaved well? Not to mention that if he was vengeful, it would be much easier to do damage from within and from a position of power.

xwolfi 2y ago
Sir, let me introduce you to Elon Musk, whose board chairman talk of like a little child you need to please with candies so he can bullshit well at earnings to pump the stock. Joke aside, the CEO can be a promoter of hype with no particular management skills - if the shareholders, via the board, are happy with that, their money their risks.

rst 2y ago

"Filed a formal complaint" with whom? The board itself is the final authority, empowered to investigate and act. If its members have concerns, they either do something or don't. There's nowhere else to pass the buck.

Aunche 2y ago
> "Filed a formal complaint" with whom? For their own records. They can use it for justification for disciplinary action or legal ammunition. It is always useful to document things in writing. It's the same reason why companies will put you on PIP.
- cdchn 2y ago
  Lie to your boss and see if they put you on a pip "Please improve your inability to tell the truth."
- florean 2y ago
  Why would you think this stuff wasn't in writing? Do you think the investigation OAI did into the board's actions was just relayed orally?[1] That the board's discussions where all done in conference calls and not in e-mail? Do you think that this documentation gets routinely released to the public or even employees? Before you throw around accusations of incompetence, you should probably have some shred of evidence. This is the type of stuff that is typically considered extremely confidential and even now they say they are unable to reveal details. Why do you think that is? What is preventing them from doing something they apparently want to? Legal agreements such as NDAs, the same ones that would have prevented them from going public with details last years. The board's mistake was not figuring out a way to go public with their case against Sam when or before they fired him. They obviously misjudged how he would respond. But even there we don't know the full context and constraints they were under. Hopefully, one of them will answer that question of why they didn't at some point, but until we know more, we would be wise to reserve judgement. [1] https://archive.is/wbwC2 https://archive.is/wbwC2
  - Aunche 2y ago

refulgentis 2y ago

This doesn't make any sense, it's attempting to carve out imaginary middle ground where there is none. Who reviews the "formal complaints" a director files about a CEO? Where have you ever worked that HR takes "formal complaints" about vaguely unethical behavior seriously? You want to pretend it was some huge surprise delivered to Sam without warning, for power's sake, because then there is middle ground. That wasn't the case.

tbrownaw 2y ago

I believe the standard advice for dealing with abusive people in personal relationships is to GTFO. Because it's generally unrealistic to think they can be fixed. Does the same reasoning not apply to supposed-to-be-trusting business relationships?

hn_throwaway_99 2y ago

> They could have filed formal complaints, mandated increased scrutiny, handed off Sam's responsibilities to other people, or threatened legal action. I think you fundamentally misunderstand the role of the board of directors. It's often been said that the board (of any company) has basically one job: to hire (and fire) the CEO. While that may be a slight exaggeration, the wisdom behind that quote is that things turn out badly when the board meddles in decisions of a company's executive leadership - if they don't like the decisions being made, they should replace the CEO, and that's where their power lies. You talk about "filing formal complaints" - what does this even mean?? They're the board, who else would they file formal complaints to? "Hand off Sam's responsibilities to other people"?? Again, any corporate governance expert would say that's a recipe for disaster, never mind not even feasible the way corporate hierarchies work. I've commented many times before that I think the way the board handled the Altman's filing was, at best, woefully naive, and their communication at the time (even after he was fired) abysmal. But neither do I think it was some sort of "coup", and your recommendations simply don't make sense.

GeorgeTirebiter 2y ago
This precisely correct. The board hires & fires the CEO. End of story. When the board is unhappy how the company is being run, their recourse is to...fire the CEO. What is unusual here is the wellspring of support from "the troops", such that if they stuck with their firing the CEO, there would be hardly any company left to be BoD of! The board didn't understand the depth of employee allegiance to sama.
- jprete 2y ago
  I saw a claim at the time that a handful of employees rallied everyone else to sign the letter and post support on Twitter. Between that and Altman reportedly having a vindictive streak, I'm thinking the actual employee support was paper-thin.
  - Rastonbury 2y ago
    Prisoner's dilemma and/or social pressure when million in profit share units hang in the balance. Joining MS was a way to stop their compensation being at risk by being stuck on a sinking ship

whimsicalism 2y ago

nah the issue was that they pay employees in PPU which is tied to Sam Altman's ability to raise capital, not to the board. the board effectively did not control the pay of its employees, whereas Sam did

surfingdino 2y ago

Ignoring for a moment the board's responsibilities and ability to implement the measures you suggest, read what you wrote again and think of it from the practical point of view. If you had a person that needed all that oversight would it not be cheaper and more practical to replace him?

MrSkelter 2y ago

The board is working with the assumption the CEO isn’t a liar. Altman is a classic sociopath, a T-1000 to Musk’s clunky T-800. OpenAI is fated to implode in scandal. His 7 trillion dollar funding round ambition is a blaring siren to anyone with a working brain that he’s out of control and capable of doing real damage. He wants a sum of money that could crash the world economy. He thinks he should have the power of the world’s most powerful government. Solely dictated by his whim. He makes Napoleon and Hitler look like pikers. He is Musk in 2016, when some of us knew who he was, and the fans were still enthralled. You will look back and say “No one knew” and this comment will be there. We knew. Musk will end up the Bush to his Trump. We will fondly recall the crimes of a guy who just wasn’t as bad as what followed. Why do you think Musk hates him so much? He’s a better Musk than Musk. He’s the guy who took OpenAI out from under him. It’s envy.

admissionsguy 2y ago
Just to be clear - Musk’s crimes are single-handedly turning the US into the leader in EV and space industries, calling one guy a „pedo” and standing trial for it, and supporting the political side that you don’t like?
- bookaway 2y ago
  > calling one guy a „pedo” Yes, and just to be clear -- That one guy was a diver who put his life at risk to save trapped children from an underwater cave, a rescue operation in the span of which a Thai Navy Seal actually died. Furthermore, Musk went on record stating that he had took a further step of hiring a private investigator to dig up dirt on the guy, not before he called the guy a pedo, but after when the reality of getting sued began to sink in.
  - tim333 2y ago
    And a guy who insulted Musk first.
    - frankzinger 2y ago