Also, working for a subsidiary (which was likely going to be given much more self-governance than working directly at megacorp), doesn’t necessarily mean “evil”. That’s a very 1-dimensional way to think about things.
Self-disclosure: I work for a megacorp.
It's a post-"Don't be evil" world today.
That is a part of the reason why organizations choose to set themselves up as a non-profit, to help codify those morals into the legal status of the organization to ensure that the ingrained selfishness that exists in all of us doesn’t overtake their mission. That is the heart of this whole controversy. If OpenAI was never a non-profit, there wouldn’t be any issue here because they wouldn’t even be having this legal and ethical fight. They would just be pursuing the selfish path like all other for profit businesses and there would be no room for the board to fire or even really criticize Sam.
If you throw your hands up and say, “well kudos to them, theyre actually fulfilling their goal of being a non profit. I’m going to find a new job”. That’s fine by me. But if you get morally outraged at the board over this because you expected the payday of a lifetime, that’s on you.
And while also working for a for-profit company.