I don't think Microsoft is a loser and likely neither is Altman. I view this a final (and perhaps disparate) attempt from a sidelined chief scientist, Ilya, to prevent Microsoft from taking over the most prominent AI. The disagreement is whether OpenAI should belong to Microsoft or "humanity". I imagine this has been building up over months and as it often is, researchers and developers are often overlooked in strategic decisions leaving them with little choice but to escalate dramatically. Selling OpenAI to Microsoft and over-commercialising was against the statues.
In this case recognizing the need for a new board, that adheres to the founding principles, makes sense.
>I view this a final (and perhaps disparate) attempt from a sidelined chief scientist, Ilya, to prevent Microsoft from taking over the most prominent AI.
Why did Ilya sign the letter demanding the board resign or they'll go to Microsoft then?
Of course the screenwriters are going to find a way to involve Elon in the 2nd season but is the most valuable part the researchers or the models themselves?
My understanding is that the models are not super advanced in terms of lines and complexity of code. Key researches, such as Ilya probably can help a team recreate much of the training and data preparation code relatively quickly. Which means that any company with access to enough compute would be able to catch up with OpenAI's current status relatively quickly, maybe in less than a year.
The top researchers on the other hand, espcially those who have shown an ability to successfully innovate time and time again (like Ilya), are much harder to recreate.
Easy to shit on Ilya right now, but based on the impression I get Sam Altman is a a hustler at heart, while Ilya seems like a thoughtful idealist, maybe in over his head when it comes to politics. Also feels like some internal developments or something must have pushed Ilya towards this, otherwise why now? Perhaps influenced by Hinton even.
I'm split at this point, either Ilya's actions will seem silly when there's no AGI in 10 years, or it will seem prescient and a last ditch effort...
In this case recognizing the need for a new board, that adheres to the founding principles, makes sense.