It was a chaotic five days for OpenAI as it experienced an internal struggle among its executives. The board decided to fire its CEO, Sam Altman but was eventually reinstated after backlash. It is now revealed that this may have been due to concerns over an AI breakthrough.
OpenAI Researchers Became Wary
The Microsoft-backed company has been at the forefront of AI technology advancements, and it appears that there has been a breakthrough that's more advanced than anyone has seen before. The secret breakthrough was said to be called Q*.
Even the most advanced AI models available to the public still can't perform with such mathematical proficiency, but OpenAI's secret AI is rumored to have extensive computing resources and can tackle specific mathematical problems.
OpenAI researchers saw the potential risks of the technology, even saying that it could "threaten humanity." The concerns were then brought to the board, which might be why they believed that Sam Altman could not be trusted anymore.
The letter that was sent by the OpenAI researchers is yet to be acquired by any news outlets, but it is likely about the safeguards that should be added to the model, as well as the commercialization of such advanced technology.
As pointed out by Interesting Engineering, Q* could be what Altman was referring to when he said that he has "gotten to be in the room when we push the veil of ignorance back and the frontier of discovery forward." This was said the day before he was ousted as OpenAI's CEO.
Even though the OpenAI researchers raised such concerns, it's evident that OpenAI employees are still loyal to the reinstated chief executive. After all, more than 700 employees threatened to follow suit if the company did not rehire Altman as the CEO.
The Events That Led to Altman's Reinstatement
It was on Friday when the news of Sam Altman being ousted as the CEO broke which surprised the entire tech industry. OpenAI board member and co-founder Ilya Sutskever said that Altman was not worried enough about the risks of AI.
As a result of these concerns, four out of six board members including Sutskever voted to fire Altman. Greg Brockman, the company's president, also followed suit in protest. This led to OpenAI hiring a new CEO, Twitch executive Emmett Shear.
This didn't last very long as he was immediately replaced by OpenAI executive, Mira Murati. All while this is happening, Microsoft revealed that they would hire Altman and Brockman as part of Microsoft's new AI research team, although this was never an official offer.
As per The New York Times, this was the moment when hundreds of employees threatened to quit as well, especially now that they can follow both AI experts to Microsoft. Altman eventually got what he wanted and returned to the company with those who voted him out, gone.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella even approved of the changes, saying that it was the "first essential step on a path to more stable, well-informed, and effective governance." With three board members gone, two will be taking their places, namely Bret Taylor and Lawrence Summers.
