OpenAI had a confusing week. Who came out on top? And who lost out?
The leadership crisis that engulfed OpenAI for nearly a week ended almost as abruptly as it began: With a terse, cryptic announcement by the company that would have enormous ramifications for its future.
In some ways, the outcome was a return to the status quo: Sam Altman would be restored as CEO, with the company’s deep and lucrative business partnership with Microsoft, which took a $13 billion stake in the company even as it ramps up its own AI research efforts, left intact.
But in other ways, the agreement is still a watershed moment for OpenAI and the artificial intelligence field writ large.
The tumultuous week seems to have resulted in a big victory for Altman personally; proponents of widespread AI adoption; and some of the country’s most established elites. And it came at the expense of AI skeptics who, by many accounts, bungled an attempt to make a principled stand for caution about the technology’s long-term risks.
