Sam Altman speaks about the OpenAI drama after the fact

Right now, the drama surrounding OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s ousting seems like ancient history, but it’s still going to be in the news for quite some time. With Microsoft now a board member of the company, it seems that there will be some changes at the company. The Verge just had an interview with Sam Altman, and he talked about some details of the whole predicament.

An interview with Sam Altman

The interview was performed by The Verge’s Alex Heath. In the interview, they talked about some of the things that went down at the company while everything was happening. When asked about some of the inciting factors that led to his firing, there wasn’t much that he could pony up.

The spark

Right now, a private investigator is looking into the matter to figure out what sparked it. Also, when asked when the board lost trust in him, Altman replied “That will be a better question for them.” Also, Altman didn’t want to talk about the misunderstanding between him and the board.

Returning to the company

Heath was able to get more information about his motivation to come back to the company. The reason for returning is one that we all could guess. He had poured a ton of time into OpenAI and genuinely loves the company. “I really loved the company and had poured my life force into this for the last four and a half years full time, but really longer than that with most of my time. And we’re making such great progress on the mission I care so much about, the mission of safe and beneficial AGI.”

So, it’s clear why he wanted to come back. He also talked about the moment he decided to come back. It did take him some time to come to this realization, it seems. Shortly after being fired, he planned on collaborating with Greg Brockman to start a new company. However, when he was asked to return he said “It took me a few minutes to snap out of it and get over the ego and emotions to then be like, ‘Yeah, of course I want to do that.’”

Other factors

There are factors that are still up in the air at this point. Reports came out about a project that researchers warned the board about called “Q*”, allegedly. Details on that project are still extremely scarce, at the moment. When asked about it, Altman said “No particular comment on that unfortunate leak.” This project will be an area of interest for the time being, as it seems like a major breakthrough in AI technology.