Twitter is full of people laying into EA for being behind Sam Altman’s firing. However, if it’s true that this happened because the board thought Altman was trying to take the company in an ‘unsafe’ direction then I’m glad they did this. And I’m glad that for the time being considerations other than ‘shareholder value’ are not the defining motivation behind AI development.
This is incredibly short-sighted. The board’s behavior was grossly unprofessional and the accompanying blog post was borderline defamatory. And Altman is one of the most highly-connected and competent people in the Bay Area tech scene. Altman can easily start another AI company; in fact, media outlets are now reporting that he’s considering doing just that, or might even return to OpenAI by pressuring the board to resign.
In fact, Manifold is at 50% that Altman will return as CEO, and at 38% that he’ll start another AI company. It seems that the board was unable to think even just two steps ahead if they thought this would end well.
Altman starting a new company could still slow things down a few months. Which could be critically important if AGI is imminent. In those few months perhaps government regulation with teeth could actually come in, and then shut the new company down before it ends the world.
You had no evidence to justify that claim back when you made it, and as new evidence is released, it looks increasingly likely that the claim was not only unjustified but also wrong (see e.g. this comment by Gwern).
Twitter is full of people laying into EA for being behind Sam Altman’s firing. However, if it’s true that this happened because the board thought Altman was trying to take the company in an ‘unsafe’ direction then I’m glad they did this. And I’m glad that for the time being considerations other than ‘shareholder value’ are not the defining motivation behind AI development.
This is incredibly short-sighted. The board’s behavior was grossly unprofessional and the accompanying blog post was borderline defamatory. And Altman is one of the most highly-connected and competent people in the Bay Area tech scene. Altman can easily start another AI company; in fact, media outlets are now reporting that he’s considering doing just that, or might even return to OpenAI by pressuring the board to resign.
In fact, Manifold is at 50% that Altman will return as CEO, and at 38% that he’ll start another AI company. It seems that the board was unable to think even just two steps ahead if they thought this would end well.
Altman starting a new company could still slow things down a few months. Which could be critically important if AGI is imminent. In those few months perhaps government regulation with teeth could actually come in, and then shut the new company down before it ends the world.
You had no evidence to justify that claim back when you made it, and as new evidence is released, it looks increasingly likely that the claim was not only unjustified but also wrong (see e.g. this comment by Gwern).