Why Was Sam Altman Fired From OpenAI?

Despite the apparently crazy success of ChatGPT amid Silicon Valley’s massive push into artificial intelligence technologies, OpenAI made a shocking decision to abruptly fire its CEO Sam Altman. The ouster took place Friday evening and stunned the tech world because Altman was seen as a competent CEO, who had just announced an aggressive series of sequels at OpenAI’s developer day earlier in the month. However, it was this aggressiveness that allegedly led to his dismissal.

Initially, OpenAI’s board released a statement claiming that Altman’s firing was because he was not “always candid in his communications.” But as the story unfolded, the board appeared to regret its decision as more details emerged. At the center of the problem was the Developer Day event, which sparked concerns that Altman was moving too quickly and dangerously with AI technology.

Via CNN:

This may be good when it comes to a dating app or social media platform. It’s something completely different when it comes to technology so effective at mimicking human speech and behavior that it can fool people into believing its fake conversations and images are real.

And that’s what reportedly scared the company’s board, which remained mostly controlled by the company’s nonprofit arm. [Kara] Swisher reported that OpenAI’s recent developer conference served as an inflection point: Altman announced that OpenAI would make tools available so that anyone could create their own version of ChatGPT.

For [Ilya] Sutskever and the board of directors were a step too far.

To be clear, the board had legitimate concerns about AI plaguing the scientific community. Unfortunately, for OpenAI, these concerns collided with the company’s need to maintain revenue through this very expensive technology, and that’s where Altman ran into trouble. ChatGPT already had to limit client usage because the cost of computing power for each query was astronomical.

Via TIME:

From Altman’s perspective, it was essential to raise more money and find additional revenue streams. But some board members, linked to the AI-skeptical effective altruism movement, saw this at odds with the risks posed by advanced AI. Many effective altruists – a pseudo-philosophical movement that seeks to donate money to ward off existential risks – have imagined scenarios in which a powerful AI system could be used by a terrorist group to, for example, create a biological weapon. Or, in the worst case scenario, the AI ​​could spontaneously deteriorate, take control of weapon systems, and attempt to wipe out human civilization. Not everyone takes this scenario seriously, and other AI leaders, including Altman, have argued that such concerns can be managed and that the potential benefits of widespread AI diffusion outweigh the risks.

Despite panic over fears that Altman would move too quickly with the controversial technology, he has already was hired by Microsoft to oversee a new AI company. Meanwhile, OpenAI employees believe that Altman’s firing was a blatant mistake and, according to Gizmodothe majority is threaten to stop if the board members who ousted Altman do not resign.

(Via CNN, TIME)