Sam Altman set to rejoin OpenAI as CEO with Microsoft's blessing
- Reference: 1700635647
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2023/11/22/sam_altman_openai_return/
- Source link:
An early Wednesday [2]post to X/Twitter detailed the move as follows:
We have reached an agreement in principle for Sam Altman to return to OpenAI as CEO with a new initial board of Bret Taylor (Chair), Larry Summers, and Adam D'Angelo.
We are collaborating to figure out the details. Thank you so much for your patience through this.
Altman also posted * to Elon Musk's social network, as follows:
i love openai, and everything i've done over the past few days has been in service of keeping this team and its mission together. when i decided to join msft on sun evening, it was clear that was the best path for me and the team. with the new board and w satya's support, i'm looking forward to returning to openai, and building on our strong partnership with msft.
Let's parse those two posts, starting with the names of the reconstituted board.
Of the three named directors, only Adam D'Angelo was previously on the board. Bret Taylor served as co-CEO of [3]Salesforce . Larry Summers is a former US treasury secretary.
The existence of a "new board" suggests some who voted for Altman's ouster have themselves been ousted.
[4]
Consider, too, Altman's assertion that he has "satya's support." That suggests Microsoft is aware of OpenAI's actions – as it should be, given it owns 49 percent of the joint – and isn't fussed that he never took up the job as boss of a new AI lab within the software giant that he arranged after his sudden dismissal.
[5]OpenAI staff threaten to leave if ousted CEO Altman is not reinstated
[6]OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's ejection sparks theories as odd as some ChatGPT output
[7]OpenAI pauses ChatGPT Plus sign-ups as it 'hits capacity'
[8]OpenAI tackles 'major outage' hitting ChatGPT APIs
The restoration of Altman appears to be a win for OpenAI's staff, who [9]reportedly threatened to quit if he was not returned to his gig.
Altman's odyssey has had more twists and turns, in less time, than almost any other tech story your correspondent has covered since my career covering tech commenced in 1995. And as OpenAI's post makes clear, there are still details to be figured out.
[10]
Something tells me there are more chapters to come in this short saga. The Register is watching and will chronicle whatever happens next. ®
* We've reproduced Altman's Xeet verbatim, including his errant capitalizations.
Get our [11]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/17/openais_board_of_directors_fire/
[2] https://twitter.com/OpenAI/status/1727206187077370115
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2022/12/01/salesforce_q323_co_ceo_departs/
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/aiml&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZV3fUjV2Wx1rh9Aca6ElnAAAAFE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/20/openai_staff_threaten_to_leave/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/19/sam_altman_openai_depature_theories/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/15/openai_pauses_chatgpt_plus_signups/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/08/outage_chatgpt_openai_claude/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/20/openai_staff_threaten_to_leave/
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/aiml&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZV3fUjV2Wx1rh9Aca6ElnAAAAFE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
6 months time there will be a recommendation for OpenAI to be absorbed in to Microsoft.
Hell, the way this has gone on, it could even be next week!
That worked so well with the Nokia Lumia buyout! As a shareholder in MS, I hope they've learnt a lesson there.
(Ron Howard voice): unfortunately, they had not learnt any lessons
Mmmmm
I wonder if we will ever find out what the reasons were for Altman being sacked back at the start of this? I'm mostly positive about the future for AI, but it has to be recognised that there are paths it could take which could be rather bad, and so it would be interesting to know what was behind this organisation falling apart.
GJC
Re: Mmmmm
It sounds like it was mostly "small company board politics" from a company that forgot its centre of the world stage. It sounds like the board felt snubbed because Sam Altman was doing something they didn't approve of (theories vary from he was in talks with others about an AI chip startup to that he was moving too fast in trying to improve the GPT models to that the board wanted more focus on AGI and less on LLMs). Rather than deal with this sensibly, the board seemed to forget they are a very visible company with investors and tried to throw their weight around. In most companies with 750 employees, no-one would even notice if the board ousted the CEO, but OpenAI is not most companies and the board seemed not to understand that.
Well, lessons have been learned, right ?
Re: Mmmmm
"AI" is about as dangerous as divining rods and tarot cards, which is to say it is pretty ineffective, but could be mis-used in dangerous ways, like the professor who asked ChatGPT if his students were cheating on an assignment.
> Larry Summers is a former US treasury secretary.
He's so much more than that -- this douche is responsible for incredible amounts of suffering. You'd have thought that he'd stay down after that disastrous Jon Stewart interview... But then again, this kind of vampire blood sucker rarely stays dead.
The old board had a gender split of 4 to 2 almost reaching the UKs FTSE350 recommendation of 40% of women on boards. Any diversity target leads to box ticking and in this case serious sub par performance.
Oh, so you're saying it was the women's fault ?
1952 called. They want you back.
TOA clearly did not say that. Re-parse it, and then apologize.
lol
Board members go for a cheap power grab, something that has been happening for millenia - "must be those damn women's fault!"
No, he clearly said it was box-ticking that was at fault.
Think about it ... being forced to tick those boxes means that they can not have an all women Board, EVEN IF they are the perfect set of people for the job.
In this context, box ticking is inherently evil.
Satya?
Satya himself won't last 6 months if he keeps this up!
Fake news?
I wonder if all of this is just an AI generated fake news story? In five minutes I will wake up just like the infamous Dallas shower scene....
Six stories about Sam Altman on the Register in the last week! Who is paying for them? Is he issuing his own press releases?
It all sounds like some kind of investment scam.
Or possibly a failed attempt to get the talent out of OpenAI and into Microsoft. To basically get the IP without paying off the other shareholders.
Ah ha! Power grab for the win!