OpenAI is currently engaged in a bloodless negotiation internally, involving whether founder Ultraman can resume his position as CEO at OpenAI and whether board members will change as a result.
According to insiders, Ultraman himself is open to returning to OpenAI, but hopes to see management changes, including the dismissal of existing board members. In addition, Ultraman also requested the company to issue a statement exempting him from punishment for misconduct.
Another source stated that the main leadership of OpenAI is also pushing for the resignation of board members and the return of Ultraman, including interim CEO Mira Murati, Chief Strategic Officer Jason Kwon, and Chief Operating Officer Brad Lightcap.
The board members led by Ilya Sutzkever, the chief scientist of OpenAI, suddenly announced the dismissal of Ultraman and stripped him of his board position last Friday. At that time, the board of directors stated that Ultraman had not been honest in his communication with the board.
Subsequently, OpenAI CEO Greg Brokman was also kicked out of the board, and he himself announced his resignation to protest the development of the day.
Ultraman, Sutskever, and Brokman are both the co founders of OpenAI and the current core team members of the company, along with interim CEO Murati, who jointly control the rudder of this artificial intelligence giant. Sutskever's move to kick away two old friends undoubtedly filled the whole thing with a sense of "palace struggle" and also fed the technology industry with food.
Old enemies of industry and research
According to Brokman's review, last Thursday night, Ultraman received a text message from Sutskever requesting a conversation the next day. Subsequently, at noon last Friday, with Ultraman participating online and everyone else present except Brokman, the board suddenly announced that Ultraman would be fired and informed that the news would soon spread.
Not long after, Sutskever held another board meeting where Ultraman was not present. Brokman learned that he would be removed from the board, but his position in the company would be retained. Brokman also stated that except for Murati, the interim CEO who was promoted to power, all other OpenAI executives were unaware of the personnel change in advance.
The difference between the OpenAI board of directors and traditional companies is that the existence of this institution is not for profit making purposes, and some board members do not hold shares in OpenAI. Its mission is to create a widely beneficial universal artificial intelligence.
At present, in addition to Sutskever, the OpenAI board includes Quora CEO Adam D Angelo, former GeoSim Systems CEO Tasha McCauley, and Georgetown Security and Emerging Technology Center Strategic Director Helen Toner.
The rumor that Ultraman was dismissed is interpreted as Sutskever collaborating with external board members to seize power, due to Ultraman's overly expansionist ambitions causing the board to be uneasy and violating Sutskever's claims on artificial intelligence security. Technology experts commented that this is a typical case of a disagreement between the R&D department and the product department.
Collective resignation and coercion
The dismissal of Ultraman was just a momentary pleasure, followed by a rebound in investors and internal technical personnel, causing the board led by Sutskever to be fiercely criticized.
Multiple investors, including Microsoft, have contacted OpenAI in the hope of bringing Ultraman back to OpenAI and assuming the position of CEO. Some people have revealed that Microsoft is offering cloud computing services at a price tag in exchange for Ultraman's leadership position.
The top artificial intelligence scientists within OpenAI have also voiced their grievances towards Ultraman and even threatened to resign collectively. According to sources, after Ultraman and Brokman left, a group of senior researchers also resigned, and more people are brewing to resign. The wave of OpenAI resignations is approaching.
Interestingly, another OpenAI founder, Musk, urgently advertised his company's recruitment portal on the X platform, urging aspiring individuals to consider xAI.
These pressures have forced the OpenAI board to consider recalling Ultraman and Brokman, while employees continue to threaten that the company needs to provide reasonable disposal within a limited time frame, otherwise there will be a wave of resignation letters.
The most critical puzzle
The continuous reversal is comparable to "Zhen Huan returning to the palace". But the mystery is why Sutskever collaborated with external board members to expel Ultraman and Brokman.
Someone's divergent thinking raises a question, assuming it's just a power struggle within the company, why is this personnel change so sudden and unprepared that Sutskever and others are now almost on fire and are likely to be swept out of the house.
Or is it that the complexity of human society is not behind it, but rather that artificial intelligence products have indeed encountered some problems that make Sutskever despair or even crazy?
Considering that Sutskever has been responsible for limiting the harm of artificial intelligence in OpenAI and often makes astonishing statements such as "AI leads to human destruction", and his teacher, artificial intelligence godfather Geoffrey Hinton, has always emphasized "regretting the development of AI", perhaps he wants to expel the more complex reasons behind Ultraman this time.
Until now, the OpenAI board of directors has been unable to explain what the so-called "lack of honesty" in the dismissal statement actually refers to. This half hidden melon has eaten Lenovo's imagination in the technology industry. Musk said that the OpenAI board has an obligation to disclose the reasons for dismissing Ultraman, as it may have a strong correlation with artificial intelligence models.
This is the most crucial piece of puzzle in the entire story. Whether it is a comical scene where the board of directors becomes clever and ends up being deceived by intelligence, or a more magical cyberpunk plot, everything may only depend on the motivation of the OpenAI board to dismiss Ultraman.