And for the OpenAI employees, they can just switch the badge in a blink second, it almost feel like a no-brainer to many.

I think Sam just took the easier route to rebuild OpenAI within MSFT.

Now the trouble comes to the SV VCs they now will be furious.

He wasn't the guy who built it, he was the guy who got things funded. Let's see how many of the core OpenAI people join. I.e. the ones that weren't (just) there for the money / post ChatGPT.

Do OpenAI staff want to work for Microsoft?

And then they get to say one of the most depressing sentences in an engineer's lexicon: "It's almost like we're a startup within a big company!"

I actually don't think OpenAI being a startup is beneficial for them at this moment.

OpenAI already has a very clear business model, that is selling completion/chat/agent API based on their model. What they need is to productize it.

Their roadmap is GPT4/5/6/7

Imagine thinking that top AI researchers are going to start choosing to work for MSFT after years of them being second class citizens there.

Like if they don’t like OpenAI they can go to 10 other places that pay more and treat researchers better than MSFT

MSFT isn't as much as an underdog you would think.

MSRA invented ResNet. MSFT also contributed DeepSpeed to the open source, which is critical in OSS LLM scene.

It is now more of just a branding thing. It will become the new cool again.

And OpenAI? After this week, how would the people view them? Definitely not envious or prestige.

Did Sam build OpenAI in the first place?

Yes? Each person OpenAI hired is passed through Sam.

Or you think Ilya wrote every line of code of GPT4?

All the claims about how OpenAI's board desperately wanted Altman back were based on leaks from "people close to Altman" which the press uncritically lapped up.

If it wasn't clear before, it should be clear in hindsight that the board's desire to welcome Altman back was, at best, overstated.

The leaks were probably an attempt to pressure the board or, failing that, undermine OpenAI.

This isn't even remotely confusing now.

This move makes it exactly clear what was going on. Microsoft is doing to AI what they tried to do to Internet browsers back in the day. I wonder if they'd have been successful if they'd managed to buy the board of Netscape.

I suspect it's rather possible that there will be an ungodly-massive lawsuit in the offing.

By joining Microsoft, they retain access to all the data, weights, and infrastructure they had at OpenAI. They don't have to start from scratch and ramp up. They can start up right where they left off.

Care to elaborate? Microsoft funding OpenAI doesn’t grant them right to just grab intellectual properties.

It does except for the AGI. That was part of the multi-billion deal with Microsoft.

Microsoft also doesn’t give many GPUs to internal researchers so this has a long way to run yet.

Wouldn’t surprise me if Sam and Greg are back on the startup path by week end.

This just seems like PR to give MS a way to paper things over after such an abrupt firing.

What makes you think it wouldn't change after Sam and Greg join the team? AFAIK the reason Microsoft scaled down their research division (including GPUs) was because they were no where close to OpenAI despite years of investment.

Not true MSFT has never given good GPUs hence why they never published any SOTA challenging models

Sam is coming on as the CEO of a whole new group. This is like Cruise. Very exciting.

I don't know the full details, but their licence is clearly quite broad, as well as being exclusive and irrevocable.

Microsoft's deal with OpenAI grants Microsoft access to OpenAI's technology --- at least until AGI arrives

How is it decided that "AGI" has arrived?

The OpenAI nonprofit board does, AIUI. That means OpenAI can, in theory, cut off everything from this day forward (by declaring GPT-5 or whatever as "AGI"), but they can't cut off access to GPT-4.

Your comment got me thinking, it's not just all the current access to all the data, weights, and infrastructure they had at OpenAI, it's also everything that will come out of OpenAI in the future.

Remember, Microsoft has an exclusive license to all models that come out of OpenAI until they reach the pre-agreed income threshold, which given the current trajectory of OpenAI, will not happen anytime soon.

I wonder if the OpenAI board will shut down the for-profit to avoid handing the tech to Microsoft now...

I wouldn't put it past them. There's never in history been as large and as wilful destruction of value as what we saw this weekend. The lawsuits will be fascinating.

Does the Microsoft deal let Microsoft continue training from e.g. the GPT-4 weights?

I guess at least it gives them access to the OpenAI models to use internally, which they kinda need as their ways of working (Greg especially) will be highly dependent on having them now.

I am confused why everyone is freaking out about some business person being let go from a tech shop.

Every once in a while, and I actually do not care much about soccer, I read comment sections in a German newspaper about soccer (please don't ask why, I have actually no clue myseld). And there, you basically have the same discussion: that player / trainer is great / sucks / rightfully / wrongfully lost his job, that club will never ever win again without person A...

It is quite intrigueing to see tge same fan / cheerleading going on when it comes to comapnies and managers. But then everything is entertainment by now...

The business person is a SV darling. And previously the President of YCombinator.

The whole situation likely arose due to Microsoft attempting to cross the boundaries set by OpenAI.

Sam joining MS was actually one of the theories I read in the initial, or one of the first, threads about his ouster. 10 billion dollar seems like a pretty steep recruiting cost, but MS knows what they are doing, right? Right?

What Sam is going to bring to MS? Recruits? MS already has all the money and infra they need.

And still they are hiring him. Different take: You are a CEO who just spend 10 billion to bevome a minority shareholder in the latest, hotest tech start up the world has ever seen. This start-up is controlled by a non-profit so. And then this non-profit kicks out the poster child of the whole industry, and you cannot do a thing about it. Well, you have to answer to a board as well. And what do you think that board will ask you about this whole affaire?

It’s called damage control. Classic corporate playbook to control the narrative. Satya and the MSFT team are geniuses in that respect.

Sam will leave soon enough to start his own thing, but in the meantime there is no narrative problem for MSFT to deal with

> I remain, confused.

I think everyone is confused.

Lol. I can relate.