You probably remember that back in November, OpenAI’s board fired the company’s co-founder and CEO Sam Altman. What followed was this incredibly complicated power struggle that eventually saw Altman restored to the CEO position and most of the board that had opposed him pushed out.
Since then, there’s been a lot of reporting about what was happening behind the scenes, but one thing that’s remained pretty vague was why the board members felt they had to take such a drastic step in the first place. The only thing the board members said publicly was that Altman had not been “consistently candid in his communications with the board” and that they no longer had confidence in his ability to lead the company.
So anyone outside OpenAI and reading that statement was probably wondering: What does that mean?
Now, one of those former board members, AI researcher Helen Toner, has given an interview with the Ted AI podcast sharing more about her side of the story. She accused Altman of “outright lying” to the board — for example, she says the board wasn’t told in advance about the launch of ChatGPT, and instead found out from Twitter. Toner also said that Altman gave the board inaccurate information about the safety processes that the company had in place. And she said Altman didn’t disclose his ownership of the OpenAI Startup Fund.
Hit play to learn more, then let us know what you think!
Correction: At the 1:28 mark, Ms. Toner was incorrectly referred to as Ms. Taylor. We regret the error.
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