OpenAI went from a not-for-profit institution seeking to build in a safe and fair way that wouldn't advantage a handful of tech elite to very much the opposite. We can speculate on Musk's own motivations or call him a hypocrite but he's not wrong in pointing out OpenAI's sketchy behavior.
If I remember correctly, they started a for-profit side business (initially to bring in a little cash) and Musk was concerned about the way it was developing and who was gaining power over the company as a result. Perhaps he just wanted to stay in charge and didn't like other VCs moving into his turf, but it's also apparent that his expressed concerns at the time proved wildly accurate.
Yeah, I've Googled around and even asked ChatGPT. There seems to be no record of a for-profit side business. At least before Elon left. Of course they created one about a year after he left, because they're were running out of money, and would need to shut-down otherwise.
I can understand not wanting Elon to be the head of your company. His behavior is a little erratic.
You're still missing the part where a not for profit literally turned itself into a multi billion dollar for profit company and no ones been held accountable.
Nonprofits have to do that if they engage in commercial activity for tax reasons. You can't just group whatever activities you want under a nonprofit and make all that money tax free. OpenAI had to split it off as a for-profit once they had a product to sell to the public. The nonprofit didn't "turn into" a for-profit, the nonprofit owns the corporation.
Mozilla has the same structure with a for-profit corporation owned by the nonprofit, which allows it to take Google's money in exchange for default search engine placement. Likewise with Wikipedia/Wikimedia, Newman's Own, and so on.
Even so, it doesn't matter. Controlling board has been replaced by cronies who have no interest in the original altruistic purpose of the company, whether they call themselves not-for-profit or not.
No, you absolutely can't. Nonprofits can't engage in substantial business activities that are unrelated to their mission. If they do, they can lose their non-profit status.
The problem is that you don't understand how tax exemption works?
According to the OpenAI charter, their mission is to "ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity." That's their legally binding mission - not selling cloud services by the token or licensing their models to companies like Microsoft and Apple. Any lawyer with half a brain would have advised them that those activities would almost certainly be found by the IRS and the courts to be unrelated business activities, so they spun them off as a for-profit corporation instead of taking an entirely unnecessary risk.
Just because their product is vaguely AGI related doesn't mean it has anything to do with their actual mission.
I've ran a not for profit worth ~$100m. All of those things are ones which fall within the original charter of openai. It's only when you start doing completely unrelated activities, like Mozilla's women who code, or you start raiding the coffers of the organization, like Wikipedia, that you need fancy structures to hide the blatant theft.
Based on this thread I find that incredibly hard to believe. Incredibly.
> It's only when you start doing completely unrelated activities, like Mozilla's women who code
Or like... Mozilla Firefox. Cause that's why they've had Mozilla Corporation since 2005. Google pays the corporation for default search engine placement and all of the full time Firefox developers I've ever known have worked for the corporation, not the nonprofit.
>Based on this thread I find that incredibly hard to believe. Incredibly.
It doesn't take much more than showing up and taking responsibility when no one else does.
>Or like... Mozilla Firefox. Cause that's why they've had Mozilla Corporation since 2005.
Yes, because Mozilla has always wanted to do more than be a browser company.
Remember Firefox OS?
Not for profits who have weird structures are there to make sure they can be looted for the benefit of the people running them, or to be used for pet projects that have nothing to do with the original charter.
Mozilla Corporation creation had nothing to do with Firefox OS or ambitions beyond Mozilla as a browser company -- it was forced on us by the IRS, after they'd promised we could take sponsorship revenue from Google for the search deal, directly into the non-profit, tax-free.
The IRS reneged, which led to the creation of the Mozilla Corporation for-profit subsidiary in 2005 to take the Google search revshare from that time on (we paid negotiated back taxes for the period when they said sponsorship revenue was okay to take tax-free into the 501c3).
Elon Musk kept giving OpenAI money after they announced they did that (even admitted that in the complaint!), which makes me suspect he's not as miffed about that decision as he claims to be.
Since we're commenting on an article about Musk's suit against OpenAI purportedly seeking the accountability the lack of which you decry, it is reasonable to assume even in the absence of a direct mention that you are expressing an opinion on the merits of Musk's suit, at least re seeking accountability of OpenAI. Especially when you comment is a direct reply to someone talking about Musk.
But I'd agree that Musk is a distraction here. OpenAI started as a non-profit project working to prevent exactly the type of irresponsible, profit-driven AI arms race it now engages in. Whether Musk is an angel or a demon is immaterial.
