The Sam Altman drama points to a deeper split in the tech world
There is little doubting the dedication of Sam Altman to Openai, the firm at the forefront of an artificial-intelligence (ai) revolution. As co-founder and boss he appeared to work as tirelessly for its success as at a previous startup where his singlemindedness led to a bout of scurvy, a disease more commonly associated with mariners of a bygone era who remained too long at sea without access to fresh food. So his sudden sacking on November 17th was a shock. The reasons why the firm’s board lost confidence in Mr Altman are unclear. Rumours point to disquiet about his side-projects, and fears that he was moving too quickly to expand Openai’s commercial offerings without considering the safety implications, in a firm that has also pledged to develop the tech for the “maximal benefit of humanity”.
The company’s investors and some of its employees are now seeking Mr Altman’s reinstatement. Whether they succeed or not, it is clear that the events at Openai are the most dramatic manifestation yet of a wider divide in Silicon Valley. On one side are the “doomers”, who believe that, left unchecked, ai poses an existential risk to humanity and hence advocate stricter regulations. Opposing them are “boomers”, who play down fears of an ai apocalypse and stress its potential to turbocharge progress. The camp that proves more influential could either encourage or stymie tighter regulations, which could in turn determine who will profit most from ai in the future.
Openai’s corporate structure straddles the divide. Founded as a non-profit in 2015, the firm carved out a for-profit subsidiary three years later to finance its need for expensive computing capacity and brainpower in order to propel the technology forward. Satisfying the competing aims of doomers and boomers was always going to be difficult.
2023-11-19 13:23:35
Post from www.economist.com
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