What Sam Altman Did That Was So Bad He Got Fired from OpenAI | Hacker News Reader

What Sam Altman Did That Was So Bad He Got Fired from OpenAI

businessinsider.com

47 pointsjacooper34 comments

> But new reporting *suggests* ...

> The fact Altman was so quickly reinstated as CEO suggests that none of these allegations were enough for the company's powerful backers

I dunno, I still think this whole thing just shows that if you do a big decision and month later people don't understand in black-and-white why then people might not be on your side.

So he was manipulative towards his colleagues and aggressive in the way he pushed their ai to the public with little consideration for its consequences?

This is one of the few times that the most prominent rumors going around while it was all happening are all correct. Makes me a little skeptical this is the full story, since it sounds so close to word on the street, but it does all make sense

The more I read about this, the more it seems like the most "boring" and predictable reason for this to happen. He is a toxic psychopath working in an (apparent) not for profit. The guy says one thing and does another, who'd a thunk it ? Sound exactly like the worst person to be in possession of some "powerful" technology.

I know a lot of people won't care because "he ships", but ultimately, this shit sucks and if true is really sad he got to keep his job. People like this are really toxic and destructive.

All of this is par for the course in the world of American tech non profits. At least employees are paid well and they ship.

This doesn't seem to be pulling from anything concrete and is speculation.

What are you talking about? The article is a mixture of established fact and separately reported hearsay. However your dismissal doesn't attempt to parse any of that and is instead a low value drive-by comment.

I'd argue the article is a low value drive-by click-bait post - and worse than that, in fact may be malicious in nature to obscure and confuse the truth - or it's just doing so as a form of harmful gossip.

If you actually care then perhaps I'll walk through with you, and we first can parse and list out what is "established fact" that they mention (and how established it actually is) vs. hearsay (which has practically no value).

I'm not sure but it's about to get a lot worse with a crook like Larry Summers on the board.

What crime has he done, exactly?

His most famous controversy is this quote from a leaked memo when he worked at the World Bank.

'the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that'

Also you could consider his polices being a key factor in the financial crisis of 07-08. Maybe crook wasn't the right word but he's certainly an unsavory character. I'm sure I could find more examples.

If he's unsavory, claim unsavory.

Forgive me, but that quote sounds like something any economist would say. Is there more to it than that? was he pushing to dump toxic waste? or was he pushing to align insentives so dumping isn’t a dominant strategy? I’m having a hard time imagining why the topic would come up in a bank.

You can read the whole memo here, it's not long.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summers_memo

Certainly comes off to me as a policy recommendation to dump waste in developing countries but I guess that's in the eye of the beholder.

Oh, ugly. Reads like some Milton Friedman BS. Hard to say if it was actually sarcastic, because by the time I was in undergrad these were sort of standard arguments used to challenge common thinking. Sarcasm can be very difficult, since it pushes ideas that less sophisticated thinkers can glom onto. Like much of what Friedman spouted was considered batshit insane at the time, and is now touted as ideals to work towards (yay tickle down! no, trust us, you’ll be a millionaire soon!). And to be clear, I consider a big percentage of our current economic problems can be attributed to his lazy thinking.

Reading

> I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly UNDER-polluted, their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City.

makes it feel like he was sincere about it not being a serious policy recommendation. I read it like Jonathan Swift recommending we eat Irish babies.

The problem is when you take into account his whole track record there's really not any reason to believe he doesn't sincerely mean that. He was a huge and influential proponent of Gramm–Leach–Bliley, yet after '08 went on the record as saying it was outrageous that the lack of regulation allowed this to happen... regulation that was in place prior to Gramm–Leach–Bliley. When the IMF chief economist warned of the '08 financial crisis years prior to this, Summers called him a luddite.

He also had an... interesting... time as Harvard president, where he set out to belittle Cornell West on a variety of issues, including some that were racially charged - specifically saying that West having a rap album was an embarrassment to Harvard. West decided to return to Princeton after that. Summers then later proposed men as having a higher population of people at the highest aptitudes to be a potential explanation for the lack of women in STEM, despite the science here being quite spotty.

I don't think there's really anything in his history that would garner giving him the benefit of the doubt here.

> 'the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that'

But that seems true. If you looked at economics only, and not morality, and not the environment, you would dump toxic waste in poor countries. To say we should face that fact doesn't seem to me at least to imply bad intent.

s/countries/counties/g

thoughts?

I agree, it could easily be an argument that using only economics to make decisions isn't advisable.

A person can be crooked without being criminal. Let's ease up on the pedantry, please?

https://www.tiktok.com/@cancelthisclothingcos/video/73067268...

TL;DW: Blackrock now has a seat at the table.

oh good, the moral fiber of society is at the table. /s

edit: video brings up some valid concerns, the reality is nothing will be done to stop Summers from manipulating the board to his favor, that's the real damning part here.

Yes

You got a link that isn't tiktok?

Whatever transgressions Sam allegedly made that led to his firing don't matter, now that he was re-hired promptly by OpenAI. The only take away here is that the previous board was clearly unfit to make any major decisions concerning the company.

No, so far the take away is that they weren't sufficiently powerful to follow through on the decision. Not that they were wrong to attempt to. To determine that it is exactly his transgressions that matter.

> so far the take away is that they weren't sufficiently powerful to follow through on the decision.

> previous board was clearly unfit to make any major decisions concerning the company.

We are saying the same thing.

These are not the same thing.

There is no guarantee in life that the people that are "right" will have the power to do the right thing, no matter how skilled they are.

It wasn't that prompt...it took significant pressure from Microsoft and a well coordinated media campaign.

I don't see how this makes any past behavior irrelevant. It provides important information to people who are asked to sit on a board with him or who are considering working at a company he runs.

> It wasn't that prompt

He was back at OpenAI in less than a week from his firing.

> I don't see how this makes any past behavior irrelevant.

You don't have to see anything. The conclusion from all the smoke and mirrors that emerged is that Altman was hired back at OpenAI. Rendering the previous board's decision null.

There’s a whole article right here full of other takeaways. What a ridiculous over-simplification.

Article doesn't explain anything definite about the whole kerfuffle regarding Sam's firing other than to provide elaborate innuendos that have little basis without official quotes from concerned parties.

Sure, there's still a lot of ambiguity. If you want to say "the only thing we definitely know right now is that the board was incapable," then I can agree with that. That doesn't mean there's not more to be learned and we need to dismiss new information. Obviously there's a distinction between the board being incapable of making good decisions or the board being incapable of effectuating good decisions, which is what everyone is keen to learn, and why people are interested in these articles.

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