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OpenAI whistleblower found dead in San Francisco apartment
- tsoukase 2y agoHalf an hour of talk with his relatives, friends, girlfriend etc and I can suggest if he or someone else murdered him. I doubt the police will go such hassle
- alsetmusic 2y agohttps://archive.is/xBuPg https://archive.is/xBuPg
- deadbabe 2y ago[flagged]
- recursive 2y agoSome do. Some don't. What's the basis for your analysis? Keep in mind that some people actually do kill themselves.
- karlgkk 2y agoIt’s not even released if it’s suicide. Please don’t uselessly speculate until more info is released. My wishes are with his family
- recursive 2y agoI'm anti-speculating. My point is that no one knows what happened.
- Maxatar 2y agoHow can someone saying that both are possibilities and to not jump to conclusions off of such little info be uselessly speculating? And then you use it as an excuse to exclaim a mostly empty gesture as if all you were interested in was virtue signaling. Very shameful on your part.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Maxatar 2y agoYes I think some people get very depressed and stressed and act out in a way they think might improve their situation. When it becomes clear that it will only end up making their situation a lot worse, they take their own life.
- s5300 2y ago[flagged]
- neilv 2y agoI think it's best not to casually make a public accusation of murder.
- calf 2y ago[flagged]
- dang 2y agoPlease don't post personal attacks here, regardless of how you feel about someone. You may not owe people who you feel are psychopaths better, but you owe this community better if you're participating in it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- calf 2y agoSam Altman is routinely accused of and criticized for manipulative, exploitative behavior. If you can't let commenters name that as psychopathy, it is you who are using fallacious reasoning. You also did not consider the context of my remark, I specifically wrote without ambiguity, formally: "How about "Person A is an X"." Just because I didn't type in those quotations doesn't mean one can interpret it any which way. It is technically a distinction of use-mention fallacy, in context of the response. Meanwhile, if the above conservative commenter hand-wrings, and outright patronizes/polices another, user about not making public accusations without being able to read in good faith, then they forfeit their standing that a response be held to a higher standard than theirs. They are the one playing moderator. Furthermore, my response merely challenges their logic, and alludes to the fact that many people in this community "feel" and variously describe Altman's psychopathic tendencies, to shine a light on the logic of their argument. What this community needs is to not rationalize their Silicon-valley techno-conservative political values to suppress strongly dissenting views, and not to abuse the moderator's power by misreading and misreporting people who criticize their prejudiced comments. I am not responsible for their lack of reading skills and not knowing what a use-mention fallacy is. I'll also note the subtle smooth presumption of telling someone it's really about how they feel. No, I believe things and my specific beliefs may be right or wrong, and at its core it is the actual ad hominem of making one side about subjective feelings rather than evidence-based, rational beliefs the way the ground rules of good faith discussions require in the first place.
- dang 2y agoYou can't post like this here, and we ban accounts that do, so please don't. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- cryptozeus 2y agomay he rip!
- bpodgursky 2y agoI'm confused by the term "whistleblower" here. Was anything actual released that wasn't publicly known? It seems like he just disagreed with whether it was "fair use" or not, and it was notable because he was at the company. But the facts were always known, OpenAI was training on public copyrighted text data. You could call him an objector, or internal critic or something.
- stonogo 2y agoThe article holds clues: "Information he held was expected to play a key part in lawsuits against the San Francisco-based company."
- abeppu 2y agoand later: >In a Nov. 18 letter filed in federal court, attorneys for The New York Times named Balaji as someone who had “unique and relevant documents” that would support their case against OpenAI. He was among at least 12 people — many of them past or present OpenAI employees — the newspaper had named in court filings as having material helpful to their case, ahead of depositions. Yes it's true it's been public knowledge that OpenAI has trained on copyrighted data, but details about what was included in training data (albeit dated ...), as well as internal metrics (e.g. do they know how often their models regurgitate paragraphs from a training document?) would be important.
- janalsncm 2y agoI guess the question is whether those documents have already been entered into evidence?
- neuroelectron 2y agoThe issue is it has to be proven in court. This man was personally responsible for developing web scraping; stealing data from likely copyrighted sources. He would have had communications specifically addressing the legality of his responsibilities, which he was openly questioning his superiors about.
- neilv 2y agoCondolences to the family. It sounds like he was a very thoughtful and principled person.
- OutOfHere 2y ago[flagged]
- henry700 2y ago[flagged]
- tivert 2y ago[flagged]
- SketchySeaBeast 2y agoYeah - what Disney does with the mouse is egregious, but if I write a book or creating painting I'd like to not have a thousand imitators xeroxing away any potential earnings.
- OutOfHere 2y agoIt is nothing like vaccines. Zero. I can easily imagine a thriving world without copyrights, but I cannot without vaccines.
- tivert 2y ago> It is nothing like vaccines. Zero. I can easily imagine a thriving world without copyrights, but I cannot without vaccines. For the record, the world can and did thrive before vaccines were invented, so you don't have to imagine it. Sure there was more sickness and death, but we have plenty of that now, and I doubt you'd consider today's world "not thriving." But ok, then. Imagine that world without copyrights for me. In detail. And answer these questions: 1. You're an author, who's written a wildly successful book in your free time. How do you get paid to become a full-time author? Remember, no copyright means Amazon, B&N, and every other place is making tons of money by printing up their own copies and sells them without giving you any royalties. 2. You've developed some open source software, and would like to use the GPL to keep it that way. Amazon just forked it, and is making tons of money off of it, but is keeping their fork closed. How do you get them to distribute their changes in accordance with the GPL? 3. You're an inventor, and you've spend years and all your savings working on R&D for a brilliant idea and you finally got it working. You don't have much manufacturing muscle, but you managed to get a small batch onto the market. BigCo saw one of your demos, bought one, reverse engineered it, and with their vast resources is undercutting you on price. They're making tons of money, and paying you no royalties. How do you stay in business? Should you have even bothered?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- sharkjacobs 2y agohttp://suchir.net/fair_use.html http://suchir.net/fair_use.html When does generative AI qualify for fair use? by Suchir Balaji
- minimaxir 2y agoIt's also worth reading his initial tweet: https://x.com/suchirbalaji/status/1849192575758139733 https://x.com/suchirbalaji/status/1849192575758139733 > I recently participated in a NYT story about fair use and generative AI, and why I'm skeptical "fair use" would be a plausible defense for a lot of generative AI products. I also wrote a blog post (https://suchir.net/fair_use.html https://suchir.net/fair_use.html) about the nitty-gritty details of fair use and why I believe this. > To give some context: I was at OpenAI for nearly 4 years and worked on ChatGPT for the last 1.5 of them. I initially didn't know much about copyright, fair use, etc. but became curious after seeing all the lawsuits filed against GenAI companies. When I tried to understand the issue better, I eventually came to the conclusion that fair use seems like a pretty implausible defense for a lot of generative AI products, for the basic reason that they can create substitutes that compete with the data they're trained on. I've written up the more detailed reasons for why I believe this in my post. Obviously, I'm not a lawyer, but I still feel like it's important for even non-lawyers to understand the law -- both the letter of it, and also why it's actually there in the first place. > That being said, I don't want this to read as a critique of ChatGPT or OpenAI per se, because fair use and generative AI is a much broader issue than any one product or company. I highly encourage ML researchers to learn more about copyright -- it's a really important topic, and precedent that's often cited like Google Books isn't actually as supportive as it might seem. > Feel free to get in touch if you'd like to chat about fair use, ML, or copyright -- I think it's a very interesting intersection. My email's on my personal website.
- bsenftner 2y agoI'm an applied AI developer and CTO at a law firm, and we discuss the fair use argument quite a bit. It grey enough that whom ever has more financial revenues to continue their case will win. Such is the law and legal industry in the USA.
- vouaobrasil 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- lolinder 2y agoNormally the word "whistleblower" means someone who revealed previously-unknown facts about an organization. In this case he's a former employee who had an interview where he criticized OpenAI, but the facts that he was in possession of were not only widely known at the time but were the subject of an ongoing lawsuit that had launched months prior. As much as I want to give this a charitable reading, the only explanation I can think of for using the word whistleblower here is to imply that there's something shady about the death.
- lyu07282 2y agoYou assume he revealed everything he knew, he was most likely under NDA, the ongoing lawsuit cited him as a source. Which presumably he didn't yet testify for and now he never will be able to. His (most likely ruled suicide inb4) death should also give pause to the other 11 on that list: > He was among at least 12 people — many of them past or present OpenAI employees — the newspaper had named in court filings as having material helpful to their case, ahead of depositions.
- lolinder 2y agoBeing one of 12+ witnesses in a lawsuit where the facts are hardly in dispute is not the same as being a whistleblower. The key questions in this lawsuit are not and never were going to come down to insider information—OpenAI does not dispute that they trained on copyrighted material, they dispute that it was illegal for them to do so.
- lyu07282 2y agoSo the lawyers who said they had "possession of information that would be helpful to their case" were misleading? Your whole rationalization seems very biased. He raised public awareness (including details of) of some wrongdoing he perceived at the company and was most likely going to testify about those wrongdoings, that qualifies as a whistleblower in my book.
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- abeppu 2y agoSo, not at all the point of the article, but ... who does Mercury News think is benefited by the embedded map at the bottom of the article with a point just labeled "San Francisco, CA", centered at Market & Van Ness? It's not where the guy lived. If you're a non-local reader confused about where SF is, the map is far too zoomed in to show you.
- tmiku 2y agoThe embedded map has a link to a "story map" that drops a pin for each recent story, mostly around the bay area. Probably a default to embed a zoom-in on each story's map entry at the bottom of the story text. They mention "Lower Haight" and "Buchanan St" for the apartment location. In lieu of an exact address of his apartment, I feel like the marked location is reasonably close to situate the story within the area - within a half mile or so?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- DevX101 2y agoAnyone who's a whistleblower should compile key docs and put it in a "dead man's switch" service that releases your testimony/docs to multiple news agencies in the event of your untimely demise. The company you're whistle blowing against and their major shareholders should know this exists. Also, regularly post public video attesting to you current mental state.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- eastbound 2y agoBut then what do you have to whistleblow?
- cced 2y agoWeren’t theres couple of dead Boeing whistleblowers in recent times relating to poor AA/design?
- dtquad 2y agoThey were whistleblowers related to Boeing manufacturing and quality control. Boeing manufacturing is also the source of the persistent Boeing problems and issues that goes back to before the MCAS catastrophic incidents and has continued after MCAS was fixed. Airbus has deeply integrated R&D and manufacturing hubs where the R&D engineers and scientists can just walk a few minutes and they will be inside the factory halls manufacturing the parts they designs. Meanwhile Boeing has separated and placed their manufacturing plants in the US states where they can get most federal and state tax benefits for job creation.
- signatoremo 2y ago> Airbus has deeply integrated R&D and manufacturing hubs where the R&D engineers and scientists can just walk a few minutes and they will be inside the factory halls manufacturing the parts they designs. This is not true. Airbus has a history of competition between French and Germany parts. The assembly plants are spread in France, Germany, UK, Spain, Italy. No such things as deeply integrated R&D and manufacturing hubs. Boeing crisis makes Airbus look better. Airbus itself isn’t renown for efficiency.
- dgfitz 2y agoI wonder who called to ask about his well-being. The Boeing guy killed himself, this guy apparently killed himself. The pattern of David vs Goliath, where David kills himself, is almost becoming a pattern.
- derektank 2y agoIf there was a gun involved, I would imagine a neighbor would have called. He was found in his apartment.
- pkkkzip 2y agoBoeing guy and OpenAI whistleblower were both seen as "not depressed" and have even gone far as to say that if anything happened to him that it wouldn't have been an accident. I'm not sure why there are so many comments trying to downplay and argue around whether OpenAI was a whistleblower or not he fits pretty much all the definition. OpenAI was suspected of using copyright data but that wasn't the only thing OpenAI whistleblower was keeping under wraps given NDA. The timing of OpenAI partnering with US military is odd.
- kube-system 2y ago> Boeing guy [...] were both seen as "not depressed" and have even gone far as to say that if anything happened to him that it wouldn't have been an accident. Yes, but also, his own brother said: “He was suffering from PTSD and anxiety attacks as a result of being subjected to the hostile work environment at Boeing, which we believe led to his death,” Internet echo chambers love a good murder mystery, but dragging a quiet and honest employee who works in the trenches through a protracted, public, and stressful legal situation can be very tough.
- zusammen 2y ago[dead]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- CyberDildonics 2y ago
- dtquad 2y agoInteresting that the NYT article about him states that OpenAI started developing GPT-4 before the ChatGPT release. They sure were convinced by the early GPT-2/3 results. >In early 2022, Mr. Balaji began gathering digital data for a new project called GPT-4 https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/23/technology/openai-copyright-law.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/23/technology/openai-copyrig...
- minimaxir 2y agoChatGPT was a research project that went megaviral, it wasn't intended to be as big as it was. Training a massive LLM on the scale of GPT-4 required a lot of lead time (less so nowadays due to various optimizations), so the timeframe makes sense.
- nextworddev 2y agoI think OpenAI officially said GPT4 finished training late 2022 alredy
- pkkkzip 2y ago[flagged]
- result2vino 2y ago[flagged]
- ipython 2y agoMurdering a us citizen on us soil is not something any enlisted or officer would do.
- smt88 2y agoThey've done it before at the request of a corporation. What has changed that they wouldn't do it now? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blair_Mountain https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Blair_Mountain
- ipython 2y ago“The largest armed uprising since the Civil War” is a very different situation than murdering an unarmed tech dude in his house and covering it up as a suicide. I’m not excusing murdering civilians either way.
- neuroelectron 2y agoThey would go to a private contractor first. Guess who starts those kinds of businesses.
- leobg 2y ago[flagged]
- system2 2y agoHe is too "soft" for that I bet. Maybe the shareholders?
- malermeister 2y ago[flagged]
- dang 2y agoWe've banned this account for repeatedly posting flamebait and unsubstantive comments and ignoring multiple requests to stop. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- fantasticfifty 2y ago[flagged]
- dang 2y agoSingle-purpose accounts aren't allowed on HN, and neither is using the site primarily for political/ideological/national battle. Since this account has been doing those things, I've banned it. Please don't create accounts to break HN's rules with. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- fantasticfifty 2y agoProtecting your pedophile Zionist handlers, got it.
- saagarjha 2y agoWhat does "banned" actually mean in this case? It seems like they were able to post non-flagged, non-dead comments in reply?
- defrost 2y agoThe response to dang's ban comment was posted in under a minute by my recollection (I saw dang's comment in the New Comment feed and by the time I browsed there the response was already in place). 'Ban' means ban but it can take a minute or two to take hold and thanks to a custom backend might still allow responses to ban notices - HN does allow people to talk themselves back from the brink once or twice if they engage and explain their actions and indicate they'll do better etc.
- dang 2y agoI unkilled https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42413279 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42413279 manually.
- BillFranklin 2y agoThere are some pretty callous comments on this thread. This is really sad. Suchir was just 26, and graduated from Berkeley 3 years ago. Here’s his personal site: https://suchir.net/ https://suchir.net/. I think he was pretty brave for standing up against what is generally perceived as an injustice being done by one of the biggest companies in the world, just a few years out of college. I’m not sure how many people in his position would do the same. I’m sorry for his family. He was clearly a talented engineer. On his LinkedIn he has some competitive programming prizes which are impressive too. He probably had a HN account. Before others post about the definition of whistleblower or talk about assassination theories just pause to consider whether, if in his position, you would that want that to be written about you or a friend.
- DevX101 2y agoIf I'm a whistleblower in an active case and I end up dead before testifying, I absolutely DO want the general public to speculate about my cause of death.
- typeofhuman 2y agoI would also most certainly have a dead man's switch releasing everything I know. I would have given it to an attorney along with a sworn deposition.
- Fnoord 2y agoWhat if you'd die from a genuine accident?
- noworriesnate 2y agoThen there's no more point to keeping that leverage, is there? Might as well make it freely available.
- addicted 2y agoYou still release it?
- notsama1111 2y ago[dead]
- atleastoptimal 2y agoEveryone will naturally speculate about anything current or former OpenAI employees do, whether it’s if they resign, the statements they make, or in this case their own suicide. It’s only fair not to speculate too far given that since there are thousands of current and former OpenAI employees, they are subject to the same conditions as the general population.
- hilux 2y agoDude graduated from Cal with a 3.98 in Computer Science! Certainly kicks my sorry ass. Being brilliant can be a burden, I guess.
- aws_ls 2y agoAlso reached Master level at Codeforces,well before joining his engineering course: https://codeforces.com/profile/suchir https://codeforces.com/profile/suchir
- mellosouls 2y agoNon-paywalled alternative (also the source in the other Reddit HN post): https://www.siliconvalley.com/2024/12/13/openai-whistleblower-found-dead-in-san-francisco-apartment/ https://www.siliconvalley.com/2024/12/13/openai-whistleblowe...
- 1vuio0pswjnm7 2y agoNo "paywall" unless Javascript is enabled.
- xvector 2y agoMetapost - Reading the (civilized!) comments on HN vs those on Reddit is such a contrast. I'm a bit worried that while regulators are focusing on X/Facebook/Instagram/etc. from a moderation perspective, not one regulator seems to be looking at the increasingly extreme and unmoderated rhetoric on Reddit. People are straight up braying for murder in the comments there. I'm worried that one of the most visited sites in the US is actively radicalizing a good chunk of the population.
- bryan0 2y agoInteresting you say that about HN, because reading this (and other) threads I have the opposite view: HN is devolving into Reddit-like nonsense.
- talldayo 2y ago> I'm worried that one of the most visited sites in the US is actively radicalizing a good chunk of the population. Thank goodness they're an American site, where the precedent for persecuting websites for active radicalization is practically nonexistent.
- xbar 2y agoWhat a terrible and sad loss.
- dash2 2y ago[flagged]
- alexpc201 2y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roko's_basilisk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roko's_basilisk
- nox101 2y agoBeing this is ostensibly related to an AI company trying to make AGI reminds me of "Eagle Eye" https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1059786/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1059786/
- nox101 2y agoCurious why the downvote? Because someone actually died? It doesn't change the fact that "Eagle Eye" is about (spoiler) an AGI killing people both directly and indirectly (by manipulating others, AI "Swats" you, ...) and here is a company trying to make AGI. If the AGI actual existed it could certainly indirectly get people killed that were threatening it's existence. It could "swat" people. Plant fake evidence (mail order explosives to the victim's house, call the FBI). It could manipulate others. Find the most jealous unstable person. Make up fake texts/images that person is having an affair with their partner. Send fake messages from partner provoking them into action, etc... Convince some local criminal the victim is invading their turf". We've already seen several examples of LLMs say "kill your parents/partner".
- jarsin 2y agoIt's highly possible that in the next tragedy carried out by a kid that has messages from any of these chatbots that can be construed as manipulation will result in criminal prosecutions against the executives. Not just lawsuits.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- kachapopopow 2y agoOkay, first boeing now openai... Yep, my view of this world being more civilized than portrayed in the movies is disappearing every day. Looks like we're going to start having to take conspiracy movie-like theories seriously now.
- slavik81 2y agoThere's surveillance camera footage of the vehicle John Barnett was sitting in at the time of his death. The conspiracy theories are not credible.
- kachapopopow 2y ago"heart attack" gun exists, it's not that improbable that similar tactics can be used. Of course you can just play this into him being crushed by the mistake he did (for his own success in the future).
- neuroelectron 2y ago"No evidence of foul play." What about the evidence that he's only 26 and has a successful career in the booming Ai industry? He doesn't seem a likely candidate for suicide. Fair use hasn't been tested in court. He has documents that show OpenAI's intention and communications about the legal framework for it. He was directly involved in web scraping and openly discussing the legal perspectives with his superiors. That is damning evidence.
- XorNot 2y agoI mean in the last week a guy with a similar profile shot and killed the United Healthcare CEO. But frankly this is a "oh that person seemed so happy, how could they have been depressed!?" line of thinking. The 2021 suicide death rate in the US population for the 26 to 44 age bracket is 18.8 per 100,000[1]. It is literally the highest rate (second is 18-25), and it is wildly skewed in favor men (22.8 / 100,000 vs 5.7 per 100,000). [1] https://www.kff.org/mental-health/issue-brief/a-look-at-the-latest-suicide-data-and-change-over-the-last-decade/ https://www.kff.org/mental-health/issue-brief/a-look-at-the-...
- neuroelectron 2y agoI get what you're saying but statistics aren't evidence of an individual's behavior.
- XorNot 2y agoSure, but as soon as someone says "what are the odds someone with X features kills himself" - well I didn't invoke the statistical argument did I? The answer is: it's right within the profile. You don't get to say "what are the odds!?" and then complain about the actual statistics - as noted elsewhere in this thread, the Birthday Paradox[1] is also at play. What are the odds of any individual whistleblower dying? Who knows. What are the odds of someone, somewhere, describable as a whisteblower dying? Fairly high if there's even a modest number of whistleblowers relative to the method of death (i.e. Boeing has dozens of whistleblower cases going, and OpenAI sheds an employee every other week who writes a critique on their blog about the company). This same problem turns up with any discussion of vaccines and VAERS. If I simply go and wave my hand over the arm of 1,000 random people then within a year it's virtually guaranteed at least 1 of them will be dead, probably a lot more[2]. Hell, at a standard death rate of 8.1/1000, OpenAI's standing number of employees of 1,700[3] means in any given year it's pretty likely someone will die - and since "worked for OpenAI" is a one-way membership, year over year "former OpenAI employee dies" gets more and more likely. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birthday_problem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birthday_problem [2] https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/death-rate/ https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/death-rate/ [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenAI https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenAI
- cbracketdash 2y agoPolice now say it's been ruled a suicide: https://sfstandard.com/2024/12/13/key-openai-whistleblower-dead-by-suicide/ https://sfstandard.com/2024/12/13/key-openai-whistleblower-d... https://www.forbes.com/sites/cyrusfarivar/2024/12/13/openai-whistleblowers-death-ruled-suicide-police-say/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/cyrusfarivar/2024/12/13/openai-... https://www.huffpost.com/entry/openai-whistleblower-dead_n_675cd791e4b07cc6a3197894 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/openai-whistleblower-dead_n_6...
- jillyboel 2y ago[flagged]
- pandemic_region 2y ago[flagged]
- greenavocado 2y ago[flagged]
- z3c0 2y agoGood lord, what an atrocious Gish gallop of selective quotes and evidence. This might be one of the worst displays of sharpshooter logic I've ever seen. AND it features a quote from William Pierce, an infamous neo-Nazi. Probably more, but I gave up after the umpteenth unverifiable quote. Just goes to show how much modern right-wing propaganda aligns with traditional neo-Nazi propaganda.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- smeeger 2y ago[flagged]
- snovv_crash 2y agoGiven the outcomes of the Facebook mood experiments and how I've seen people put together very targeted ads, I'm wondering whether it's possible to induce someone (who's already under a lot of pressure) to commit suicide simply via a targeted information campaign. I'm speculating less on what happened here, and more on the general "yes that would be possible" situation. How would one protect themselves from something like this? Avoid all 'algorithmically' generated data sources, AdBlock, VPN, don't log in anywhere?
- AliAbdoli 2y agoI'm going to have to go with Tyler The Creator's advice here: "Just Walk Away From The Screen"
- amelius 2y agoTry it now. I'm sure you'll be back within 24h.
- AliAbdoli 2y agoYouTube is the only algorithmic thing I use and I'm not getting depression content so not sure what the point is. I do constantly click not interested to get the algorithm to recommend what I actually want to though. If I was getting bad content I'd think it'd be pretty easy to stop watching YouTube and watch more Netflix or something. Completely removing all screens would be quite hard though yes in the modern world. Tbh idk how people lived before TVs.
- exe34 2y agothere was a video of a guy who pranked his housemate - http://mysocialsherpa.com/the-ultimate-retaliation-pranking-my-roommate-with-targeted-facebook-ads/ http://mysocialsherpa.com/the-ultimate-retaliation-pranking-... I don't know how much this is embellished, but I'd say it's not too hard. for defence, as others have said, walk away from the phone. spend time with friends. I personally swear out loud followed by the name of the company whenever I see a YouTube advert, I hope it helps me avoid making the choices they want me to.
- strogonoff 2y agoSuchir’s suicide (if it was a suicide) is a tragedy. I happen to share some of his views, and I am negative on the impact of current ML tech on society—not because of what it can do, but precisely because of the way it is trained. The ends do not justify the means—and it is easy to see the means having wide-ranging systemic effects besides the ends, even if we pretended those ends were well-defined and planned (which, aside from the making profit, they are clearly not: just think of the nebulous ideas and contention around AGI).
- gsibble 2y agoI enjoy using Generative AI but have significant moral qualms with how they train their data. They flagrantly ignore copyright law for a significant amount of their data. The fact they do enter into licensing agreements with some publishers basically shows they know they are breaking the law.
- mbix77 2y agoThink about the current geopolitical climate and the possibility this person was actually targeted by malicious actors as a way to sow chaos and distrust in the establishment in the West. What better way to make people grow weary of the digital platforms that are making up a majority part of their lives in their bubbles.
- MichaelMoser123 2y agoRIP. Suchir was a man of principles, he probably had to give up his OpenAI options as a result of his stance - OpenAI is reported to have a very restrictive offboarding agreements [1] " It forbids them, for the rest of their lives, from criticizing their former employer. Even acknowledging that the NDA exists is a violation of it. If a departing employee declines to sign the document, or if they violate it, they can lose all vested equity they earned during their time at the company, which is likely worth millions of dollars." [1] https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2024/5/17/24158478/openai-departures-sam-altman-employees-chatgpt-release https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2024/5/17/24158478/openai...
- rkagerer 2y ago> It forbids them, for the rest of their lives, from criticizing their former employer. Even acknowledging that the NDA exists is a violation of it. Can someone with legal expertise weigh in on how likely this would be to hold up in court?
- Bluestein 2y agoI was wondering myself. Also, the whole thing about losing vested equity - would that hold up in court?
- n144q 2y agoMy guess is that a lawsuit from OpenAI itself is enough to ruin your life. They don't even need to win the case. Completely unrelated: https://jalopnik.com/uzi-nissan-spent-8-years-fighting-the-car-company-with-1822815832 https://jalopnik.com/uzi-nissan-spent-8-years-fighting-the-c...
- tux3 2y agoI have it from good authority that — even in the absence of a lawsuit — fighting OpenAI can lead to having dramatically less time to enjoy life. It's a bit like smoking. Some activities are just not good for your health.
- 2y ago
- WhereIsTheTruth 2y ago[flagged]
- sidcool 2y ago[flagged]
- pandemic_region 2y agoTotally agree, there's just not enough money going around in the valley to make it worthwhile discontinuing a person's life. Glad we're on the same page.
- mistrial9 2y agoexcept.. this is San Francisco here .. totally different
- dudeinjapan 2y agoWhen I die, as a last wish, I hope people will go wild with speculative assassination theories. Especially if the police find "no evidence" of foul-play or the coroner says it was due to "old age"--it can only mean the cops and docs are also in on it.
- rafram 2y agoWow. Suchir was my project partner in a CS class at Berkeley (Operating Systems!). Incredibly smart, humble, nice person. It was obvious that he was going to do amazing things. This is really awful.
- Bluestein 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- bdndndndbve 2y agoThis is extremely sad and I'm sorry for Suchir's family and friends. As someone who has struggled with suicidal ideation while working in the tech industry for over a decade, I do wonder if the insane culture of Bay Area tech has a part to play. Besides the extreme hustle culture mindset, there's also a kind of naive techno-optimism that can make you feel insane. You're surrounded by people who think breaking the law is OK and that they're changing the world by selling smart kitchen appliances, even while they're exploiting workers in developing countries for cheap tech support and stepping over OD victims outside their condo. This mindset is so pervasive you really start to wonder if you're crazy for having empathy or any sense of justice. I have no special insight except to guess that going from being an obviously brilliant student at Berkeley to a cut-throat startup like OpenAI would be a jarring experience. You've achieved everything you worked your whole life for, and you find you're doing work that is completely out of whack with your morals and values.
- steeeeeve 2y agoMental health challenges in the bay area tech industry are real for a wide variety of reasons. There's a bigger push in silicon valley for work life balance and mental health care than anywhere else I've been, but more people with serious issues there than anywhere else I've been as well. Imposter syndrome is high among engineers of all levels of experience and ability. Engineering has it's own set of pressures. Then you add in all the other reasons people can feel stressed or pressured and all of the bay area specific reasons those things are amplified. It adds up. You would be surprised how many brilliant and highly capable people have broken down. For anyone out there feeling like they are all alone - don't. Even if all the people around you seem happy and confident, I guarantee that a larger portion of them than you realize are struggling.
- gsibble 2y agoWell put. Almost all of the SF startups I worked for were run by sociopaths willing to break any rule I eventually learned. One is now being charged by the FTC for massive violations. I hated the immoral mindset of winning at the cost of everything from employee comfort to flagrantly illegal activities with customers.
- 2y ago
- tempeler 2y agoPeople neglect the priorities of working life. First safety, it is best to avoid any unnecessary risks and to act so that you stay safe. second security.
- WhereIsTheTruth 2y ago[flagged]
- sheepscreek 2y agoDeeply saddening, especially given what was at stake. It takes someone truly exceptional to challenge the establishment. RIP Suchir. May the light of your candle, while it burned, have sparked many others.
- npvrite 2y agoUnfortunately, many whistleblowers don't take proper precautions to release information that will make them a target. QubesOS, disposable laptop, faraday cage, and never work from home. https://www.qubes-os.org/ https://www.qubes-os.org/
- cutemonster 2y agoWhy do you need the Faraday cage?
- npvrite 2y agoThe whistleblower's cell phone will be pinging their location to apps and cell towers periodically. It's an extra layer of protection against more powerful threat actors. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/12/19/opinion/location-tracking-cell-phone.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/12/19/opinion/locat...
- lawrenceyan 2y agoThis is incredibly sad, Suchir went to my high school and we both went to Berkeley together. He was clearly very intelligent, and I was always sure he'd go on to be very successful / do interesting things. If you're struggling reading this, I want to say that you're not alone. Even if it doesn't feel like it right now, the world truly wants you to be happy. The path is open to you: Old Path White Clouds [0] Opening the Heart of Compassion [1] Seeing That Frees [2] [0] https://z-library.sk/book/1313569/e77753/old-path-white-clouds-walking-in-the-footsteps-of-the-buddha.html https://z-library.sk/book/1313569/e77753/old-path-white-clou... [1] https://z-library.sk/book/26536611/711f2c/opening-the-heart-of-compassion.html https://z-library.sk/book/26536611/711f2c/opening-the-heart-... [2] https://z-library.sk/book/3313275/acb03c/seeing-that-frees-meditations-on-emptiness-and-dependent-arising.html https://z-library.sk/book/3313275/acb03c/seeing-that-frees-m...
- sobkas 2y agoIf death is a suicide it doesn't automatically means that third parties weren't involved. It's possible to push (temporally) vulnerable people over the edge, even if when helped/left alone they wouldn't. Especially if one party have incentive to discredit/destroy such person, so court/jury won't take their testimony seriously(or there will be no testimony at all). After all it's almost impossible to connect such actions with subsequent suicide. While suicide is by definition action of individual, what leads to it isn't always the same.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- neycoda 2y agoEven if he was a whistleblower and had documents against them, there's 12 other witnesses that prosecutors have in the lawsuits against OpenAI, and they're not dead
- cbracketdash 2y agoHis parents are skeptical it's a suicide and are ordering a second, independent autopsy: https://sfist.com/2024/12/26/parents-of-openai-whistleblower-dont-believe-he-died-by-suicide-order-second-autopsy/ https://sfist.com/2024/12/26/parents-of-openai-whistleblower...