While being terribly annoyed with the events since Friday (not because they affect me directly but because of the sheer amount of useless noise created by them), I was thinking that these folks joining Microsoft are short sighted and won’t last or stay very long there. I’m glad to see an echo of that here.
> and execution risk (see DeepMind within Google for how all the smartest people in AI can still get stymied by the bureaucracy of a giant company).
> I think the chances of the senior OpenAI folks still being at Microsoft in 3 years is asymptotically approaching zero. Where the independence and clear mission of OpenAI was exactly what could have kept that group of incredible talent motivated and aligned over the long term, making Office365 spreadsheets a bit more clever isn’t something that rallies a team like their’s. Sure they’ll try and have some level of independence, but the machinery of a trillion dollar+ business software behemoth is hard to not get caught up in and ground out by.
I’d give them one year, maximum, before they all split up and either go back to OpenAI or form new companies in alliance with other money-minded devils with deep pockets.
Now might be a good opportunity for others in this space to take advantage of the chaos, and in making things worse for OpenAI and Microsoft. And I can’t wait for this to get out of the news cycle.
Let's say that these folks leave in a year, as you suggest. So what? Microsoft gets to ride this wave even further. If there's a chance they get some meaningful benefit, even better.
And, I'm not sure, but the "new" Microsoft might be able to actually keep their newly acquired talent. Imagine if Microsoft is able to cater to them like a "startup" would, but then be backed with real money (e.g. not VC money) Companies that can support a "startup culture" inside of the traditional business, this really can create some powerful outcomes. Think of Apple on many occasions, for example.
So who knows. I doubt the old (cough Ballmer) Microsoft could pull this off. And maybe there's just too much Softy still in there, but I tend to think that maybe the Nadella Microsoft might have a chance and can benefit from this OpenAI shakeup.
Semaphor said that only a fraction of it was actually spent so far: https://www.semafor.com/article/11/18/2023/openai-has-receiv...
And even still, 11B dollars is bad but certainly not world-ending for Microsoft.
I do wonder what the stock market reaction will be if @sama goes back to OpenAI.
Does Microsoft still win (any moreso than it was winning previously)?
It's possible that none of them will ever be closed because will we ever know the reason, and if it is told will it be credible?
Seems like a pretty sweet deal to me.
1. Microsoft is offering GPT APIs in Azure. They’re already taking accountability for the technology.
2. Much of their investment in OpenAI has been in the form of Azure credits and not all of it has been paid yet.
3. Microsoft wouldn’t bring the OpenAI team into the core company. They’d let them build a new company that Microsoft owns. That’s a big difference.