1y ago

505 of 700 OpenAI employees tell the board to resign.

Source: https://twitter.com/karaswisher/status/1726599700961521762

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It’s rather interesting here that the board, consisting of a fairly strong scientific presence, and not so much a commercial one, is getting such hate.
People are quick to jump on for profit companies that do everything in their power to earn a buck. Well, here you have a company that fires their CEO for going too much in the direction of earning money.
Yet every one is all up in arms over it. We can’t have the cake and eat it folks.
- It's my opinion that every single person in the upper levels is this organization is a maniac. They are all a bunch of so-called "rationalist" tech-right AnCaps that justify their immense incomes through the lens of Effective Altruism, the same ideology that Sam Bankman-fried used to justify his theft of billions from his customers.
  Anybody with the urge to pick a "side" here ought to think about taking a step back and reconsider; they are all bad people.
  
  even outside the upper tiers, high paid tech workers do mental gymnastics to rationalize the shittiness they do via their companies while calling themselves liberal. motherfuckers will union bust for their company for a larger TC next year then go on LinkedIn or Facebook and spin it like "I successfully destroyed a small town's economy, killed a union forming in the division I manage, and absolutely threw my coworkers under the bus this year. My poor father swept countless floors until his hands bled so I can be here today and that's why I support the small working man and will never forget where I came from #boss"
  
  Yep these fucks are all doom cultists, and I bet more than a few of them are nonironically Roko’s simps
  
  Wisdom.
- Well, here you have a company that fires their CEO for going too much in the direction of earning money.
  Yeah, honestly, that's music to my ears. Imagine a world where organizations weren't in the business of pursuing capital at any cost.
  
  I think what a lot of people object to is the speed and level of complete disorganization that this was done with. Why did Microsoft only get a 60 second warning.
- Sounds like the workers all want to end up with highly valued stocks when it goes IPO. Which is, and I'm just guessing here, the only reason anyone is doing AI right now.
- This was my first thought... But then why are the employees taking a stand against it?
  There's got to be more to this story
  
  Bandwagoning. The narrative is so easy to spin "hey the evil board of directors forced our beloved CEO to leave. If they do that to /US/ we need to do it back to /them/.
  I think that would get most people with moral concerns on board, the rest are just tech bros and would fully support a money grubbing unethical CEO if they thought they might get a bigger bonus out of it.
  
  I mean, isn’t this just an attempt to instil democracy in their workplace? If the vast majority of employees want something, whether or not it is objectively in their best interest, shouldn’t leadership listen to them? Isn’t this just what unions do on the regular?
  I have no dog in this fight, I don’t know who’s a good person and who’s bad, but I believe in democracy even when it doesn’t produce the best result. I wish all companies acted upon the wishes of their employees rather than their shareholders, customers or consumers; that would make for far more cohesive and productive workplaces.
  
  Democracy works best when the people voting are well informed. I'm saying it seems like people have been manipulated by a very easy "us vs them" narrative to get the lower employees on board with the wishes of the upper management. And if you poised the question of "what direction should the company take, to pursue ethical AI or to try and make profitable AI" or something similar you probably would get different results.
  Also this isn't really democracy in the work place just people attaching their names to a letter. Of which I'm betting most didn't even read themselves.
  
  Sure, but the answer to a lack of an informed public is not reverting away from democracy; it’s trying to inform the voters. Very many people vote against their best interests on a regular basis in a political sphere, and we shouldn’t revoke their right to vote as a result. Democracy, as a principle, should still prevail.
  I don’t think it’s fair to infantilise people you’ve never met in the way that you are. What evidence do you have that the people who signed on to this letter didn’t read it? What evidence do you have that they’re either naïve or easily manipulated? I think they’re unfair assumptions. They may be true, but I have no idea if that’s the case.
  
  I'm working on the assumption that the people working at the company are a fairly typical example of the general population.
  So I'm applying my experiences of people in general to them. It's would be like assuming they didn't read a software licence because most people don't do that. And I know from previous experience that people would get an email asking them to put their name to this letter and would opt to do so based on their existing opinions, and wouldn't take the time to actually read it. Of course some people did, but I think it's a safe assumption to say most didn't.
  
  I’d argue that a group of new-tech employees is a specifically atypical example of the general population. They’re very likely tertiary qualified (minority), they’d all be earning more than six figures (minority), they’re likely on the lower end of the age bracket, and I doubt they’re representative with regards to gender and cultural background as that’s a known issue in tech. I’m not sure that cohort is in any way representative of the general population.
  I’m not trying to take a stand here; I have no dog in this fight. I’m just trying to elucidate why making such an assumption might not be wise. As I’ve said before; it may be true, but I (and you) have no idea if that’s actually the case, so assuming it serves no real value.
  
  I too think all the people I disagree with are simply stupid and ill-informed, as that is truly the highest form of intellectual integrity
  
  Not at all what I'm saying but go off.
  
  Whatever I'm betting you didn't even fully read my comment. You're obviously not informed or are being manipulated. Maybe if someone just explained it to you differently you'd understand what my comment says and support it
  
  Yes take lemmy comments very seriously, get into fights with strangers on the internet.
  
  I literally just quoted you. lol
  Mom and Dad aren't fighting, Squirt, we're just talking about something very exciting!
  
  Not at all. But keep pouring salt over a lemmy comment if it helps you.
  
  They all want to become millionaires. Think IPO.
- I immediately thought that the board was bad, then read the context…
  so are the employees backing Altman because it means more money for the company/them? Or is there another reason?
- Well, here you have a company that fires their CEO for going too much in the direction of earning money.
  I think this is very much in question by the people who are up in arms
  
  Altman went to Microsoft within 48 hours, does anything else really need to be said? Add to that, the fact that basically every news outlet has reported - with difference sources - that he was pushing in exactly in that way. There’s very little to support the fact that reality is different.
  
  The board has given no real reasoning for why they fired him. Until they do, there's no reason anyone should consider this anything other than an internal power struggle that resulted in a coup.
  And Sam didn't have a job anymore. Why shouldn't he go work for Microsoft? He was pushed out of OpenAI, is he contractually bound to never do something different?
  
  I'm not the one contesting it, but there's a strong contingent of people who believe Altman's interest is in developing AGI and little else. To them, him taking that position could be explained him positioning himself to affect broader influence.
  That's not my personal interpretation, but it is at least a little surprising that the rift is between him and his BOD. Presumably they would all have the same financial incentive to monetize their project, not just Altman.
  Personally, I think people being quick to draw any conclusion from this are putting the cart before the horse. It's not clear to me at all what the competing interests are, if it's not just completely political posturing to begin with.
- Is that actually the case? I've not seen any actual information yet about what happened or why they did what they did.
  If they've actually stated that the guy was fired because the company was going too far down the focus on money making route, that would be huge news I'd be really interested in hearing.
- I'm sure some amount of the negative press is propaganda from corporations who would like to profit from using AI and are prevented from doing so by OpenAI's model some how.
- What we have here, is a company that fired its CEO for vague and cryptic reasons and a whole lot of speculation on what the real issue was. These are their own words:
  https://openai.com/blog/openai-announces-leadership-transition
  I'm not trying to defend Altman or the altruism of Microsoft. Although I would like to understand why this firing happened and why it was done in such an abrupt and dramatic manner.
- Even if I agree with the decision that doesn't mean I agree with how the decision was carried out.
- From the outside, this story plays out like a bunch of snivelling family members of a lottery winner who plotted to steal all his money and throw him out, because he's "not candid".
  The rest of the family, who also lived with the guy, clearly don't agree and are now demanding that the thieves turn themselves in.
  I mean, sure they may even have real reasons to kick him out, but man did they fuck this one up...

295 comments