OpenAI Leadership Exodus Panic

Wait what? Murati is leaving, Schulman left, Karpathy left, Ilya left, Leike left, Brockman is on leave, perhaps a dozen others left, GPT-5 hasn’t dropped, Sora hasn’t shipped, the company had an operating loss of $5b last year, there is no obvious moat, Meta is giving away similar software for free,many lawsuits pending, and people are valuing this company at $150 billion dollars? Absolutely insane. Investors shouldn’t be pouring more money at higher valuations, they should be asking what is going on. I shared the following note with the OpenAI team today. Hi all, I have something to share with you. After much reflection, I have made the difficult decision to leave OpenAI. My six-and-a-half years with the OpenAI team have been an extraordinary privilege. While I’ll express my gratitude to many individuals in the coming days, I want to start by thanking Sam and Greg for their trust in me to lead the technical organization and for their support throughout the years. There’s never an ideal time to step away from a place or people that you’ve invested in, but this moment feels right. Our recent releases of text-to-speech and OpenAI o1 mark the beginning of a new era in interaction and intelligence – achievements made possible by your ingenuity and craftsmanship. We didn’t merely build smarter models, we fundamentally changed how AI systems learn and reason through complex problems. We brought safety research from the theoretical realm into practical applications, creating models that are more robust, aligned, and steerable than ever before. Our work has made cutting-edge AI research intuitive and accessible, developing technology that adapts and evolves based on everyone’s input. This success is a testament to our outstanding teamwork, and it is because of your brilliance, your dedication, and your commitment that OpenAI stands at the pinnacle of AI innovation. I’m stepping away because I want to create the time and space to do my own exploration. For now, my primary focus is doing everything in my power to ensure a smooth transition, maintaining the momentum we’ve built. I will forever be grateful for the opportunity to build and work alongside this remarkable team. Together, we’ve pushed the boundaries of scientific understanding in our quest to improve human well-being. While I may no longer be in the trenches with you, I will still be rooting for you all. With deep gratitude for the friendships forged, the triumphs achieved, and most importantly, the challenges overcome together.

A screenshot of a Gary Marcus post criticising OpenAI’s valuation despite a wave of executive departures, delayed products, losses, lawsuits, and free competition from Meta. Below it is Mira Murati’s formal announcement that she is leaving OpenAI, creating a comic contrast between polished corporate gratitude and the surrounding sense of institutional collapse. It is used as a reaction to chaotic company news, mass departures, or absurd investor optimism. EN: A screenshot of a Gary Marcus post criticising OpenAI’s valuation despite a wave of executive departures, delayed products, losses, lawsuits, and free competition from Meta. Below it is Mira Murati’s formal announcement that she is leaving OpenAI, creating a comic contrast between polished corporate gratitude and the surrounding sense of institutional collapse. It is used as a reaction to chaotic company news, mass departures, or absurd investor optimism.

• @gentoomemes / 13601 2024-09-26