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- The Implosion of OpenAI
Hello readers,
Welcome to another edition of This Week in the Future! With the holidays coming up, we wanted to get this out to you early, and it’s good timing, as the unprecedented implosion of OpenAI has just stabilized (for now) with Sam Altman returning as CEO, allowing us to provide you with a complete timeline of what transpired.
As always, thanks for being a subscriber! We hope you enjoy this week’s content — no podcast or video breakdown this week. Happy Thanksgiving!
Let’s get into it!
The Implosion of OpenAI
The recent events at OpenAI, bookended by the dramatic firing and subsequent return of co-founder Sam Altman as CEO, unfolded live on X over the weekend and involved a complex series of events occurring in quick succession:
Timeline of Events
November 17, 2023: The upheaval begins when OpenAI’s non-profit board of directors, which includes Ilya Sutskever (OpenAI Chief Scientist), Adam D’Angelo (CEO of Quora), Tasha McCauley (entrepreneur and wife of Joseph Gordon-Levitt randomly), and Helen Toner, fire CEO Sam Altman for not being “consistently candid” with the board, demote President of OpenAI Greg Brockman, who quits after Altman’s firing, and appoint OpenAI CTO Mira Murati as interim CEO.
November 18, 2023: It emerges that investors, including Microsoft, were blindsided and only given minutes notice on the leadership change. OpenAI’s future is cast into doubt and rumors swirl of Sam Altman’s next venture. In an internal memo, OpenAI COO Brad Lightcap clarifies that Altman's firing was not due to malfeasance.
November 19, 2023: Altman is expected to meet at OpenAI's headquarters as efforts to reinstate him as CEO gain momentum. However, board negotiations hit a snag, and the board frantically searches for a new CEO. Alexandr Wang, CEO of Scale AI, and Nat Friedman, former CEO of GitHub, are offered the role but decline. The board then attempts to merge OpenAI with Anthropic, but CEO Dario Amodei declines. Emmett Shear, former CEO of Twitch, is appointed interim CEO.
November 20, 2023: It’s announced that Altman and Brockman will join Microsoft to lead a new advanced AI research team. Ilya Sutskever expresses regret over his role in Altman's removal and seeks to reunify the company. About 700 of the 770 OpenAI employees threaten to resign if the board does not reinstate Altman. Mira Murati and Ilya Sutskever are among the employees who sign the letter to the board.
November 21, 2023: Interim CEO Emmet Shear says he will resign if the board does not produce evidence of their vague allegations against Altman. Altman and the board reach an agreement for his return as CEO, leading to the formation of a replacement board including Bret Taylor (former CEO of Salesforce) and Larry Summers (former US Secretary of the Treasury). Adam D’Angelo remains. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Sam Altman are expected to have board seats in the future.
Why Did This Happen?
Much like stable diffusion, the picture is becoming clearer. While there is much speculation and nothing is certain as of now, it seems as though OpenAI’s implosion was a consequence of the broader war between effective altruists (who have taken a liking to AI safety and deceleration) and “e/acc” (effective accelerationists). Notable so-called “doomers” like Max Tegmark and Eliezer Yudkowsky were quick to support the board’s decision. Sam Altman had apparently clashed with board member Helen Toner over a paper she wrote criticizing OpenAI and praising rival Anthropic for its safety-first approach. To clarify, the stated mission of the non-profit board is to ensure that AGI is safe and beneficial for humanity. If this meant destroying OpenAI as a company, then they would not hesitate to do so (they also have no financial stake in OpenAI).
🔥 Rapid Fire
Anthropic releases Claude 2.1 with 200K context
Stability AI introduces stable video diffusion
Microsoft teaches small language models how to reason
NVIDIA and Genentech collaborate on AI drug discovery
Amazon provides free AI skills training
New legislation seeks international cooperation on AI
Meta disbands its responsible AI team
NVIDIA reports record Q3 results driven by AI demand
Microsoft’s AI copilot for Windows 10 is available to test
Robot police dog helps end standoff
Elon Musk’s Grok AI will be added to X Premium Plus
🎙️ The AI For All Podcast
In case you missed last week’s episode, we talked to Clare Stark, UN Coordination Officer at UNESCO, who discussed developing a global standard for AI ethics and the challenges around deepfakes, misinformation, and AI governance.
📖 What We’re Reading
This week’s handpicked content includes a piece by Algolia about the building blocks of conversational AI, plus how to make AI not only generate content but also revenue.
Breaking Down the Building Blocks of Conversational AI (link)
“The holiday shopping season is upon us, and while your retail organization’s HR team remains laser-focused on scaling your workforce, you’re assessing how you can make meaningful adjustments to your tech stack to ensure you provide customers with an incredible online shopping journey. One disruptive technology that should top your wish list? Conversational AI.”
How to Make Generative AI a Revenue Generator (link)
“Generative AI tools like ChatGPT have given content creators the ability to quickly generate high-quality content and has led many creators to incorporate the tools into their workflows. But producing great content is just the first step. To build a sustainable business, you need to monetize that content. Here are three proven tactics for monetizing AI-generated content.”