26 Comments

"From the outside, it’s extremely hard to see how all that adds up to a well-played, well-thought through hand." Feels like obscure strategy, or a game of 🎲

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I don't think there is any strategy. Just the usual squabble between different people wanting different things.

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founding

Just looking at something from Gary's last post:

"First, I know two of the members of the board, one quite well, and both strike me as bright, sober people. Neither seems impetuous to me." So, I guess it was the other two who let the dogs out.

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author

it actually looks pressure from the investors to reverse their decision, based on further news.

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➕ This makes the most sense. The investors were not forewarned of the Board's decision and that's a fairly significant matter.

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founding

I guess the non-impetuous board, ironically moved fast and broke things.

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I think we can legitimately call it an “implosion” now.

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And let’s not forget, all of OpenAI’s data and models are currently sat on Microsoft owned machines.

“You do realise, all your gold is in our vault?”

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Nah. I would have been worried if this was about defrauding investors or the technology was a dud. As it is, it is just an argument about speed of development vs safety.

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Oh? Did Sam not candidly tell Ilya how fast Ilya was working?

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If anything, the last 24 hours have shown there was no plan, no play, no well-thought through hand.

What did they think would happen? It’s hard to believe the board did not anticipate the impact of their decision. Either something truly egregious happened that warrented such a dramatic move (that we don’t know about yet) or the board acted on a whim.

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I'd even say there're no "visionaries" in business as a whole, only survivors who tell the "success" story as if they've planned it all from the beginning (they haven't, not even Jobs or Sam). It's all just a stochastic chaotic system and no one has any idea what works, especially long-term. They hedge certain bets but that's about it.

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Best takes of the evening....

This is like Steve Jobs getting the sack from Apple and coming back after 12 years... only for the TikTok generation.

This makes Elon Musk look stable.

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Oh no!

Hot on X... "OpenAI should bring back Elon Musk!"

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LOL Gary just seeing this latest news as well... can't a woman go shopping for holiday chocolate without Silicon Valley upending the world after it's upended the world?

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author

clearly no 🫠

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The board is simply incompetent and has to go. Imagine how mad Satya is given his all-in at Microsoft Ignite this past Monday.

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A multi-billion investment and pressure to succeed collides with the idealism of board members. The odds are the idealists will lose.

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founding

Why do we always assume that the ideals of idealists are ideal? Tasha McCauley and Helen Toner have ties to the Effective Altruism movement. A big fan of that "ideal" was SBF.

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Nov 20, 2023·edited Nov 20, 2023

If they want capricious communications and faux pas, why not replace the board w/ChatGPT?

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I dont think they lose the secondary if Sam comes back and starts chopping the heads of the true believers. I imagine this the perspective of the employees as well

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The sharks and PR types on the board are staring to realize their consumers are able to influence their investors. That’s actually an important shift. It doesn’t speak to the competency of their organization, but it speaks to a changing of general operations in the tech industry.

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ditto.,.,,sounds bout right

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Nov 19, 2023·edited Nov 19, 2023

I don't know why, but for some reason, a vivid picture of big kids messing with silicon in large sandboxes comes to my mind each time I hear news related to some SillyCon Valley companies. It is not The Sandbox Game, for sure. 🙄

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