OpenAI’s Lens on the Near Future
Newton has the best take I’ve read (and I’ve read a lot) on the ongoing OpenAI / Sam Altman situation… worth your time:
OpenAI’s alignment problem – by Casey Newton – Platformer:
At the same time, though, it’s worth asking whether we would still be so down on OpenAI’s board had Altman been focused solely on the company and its mission. There’s a world where an Altman, content to do one job and do it well, could have managed his board’s concerns while still building OpenAI into the juggernaut that until Friday it seemed destined to be.
That outcome seems preferable to the world we now find ourselves in, where AI safety folks have been made to look like laughingstocks, tech giants are building superintelligence with a profit motive, and social media flattens and polarizes the debate into warring fandoms. OpenAI’s board got almost everything wrong, but they were right to worry about the terms on which we build the future, and I suspect it will now be a long time before anyone else in this industry attempts anything other than the path of least resistance.