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Former OPENAI employees and the main experts in artificial intelligence join their strengths to oppose the transition from the Chatpt manufacturer to a for -profit business for concerns about the dangers of progression technology.
The leading academics Geoffrey Hinton, Margaret Mitchell and Stuart Russell, as well as 10 former OpenAi staff, are the latest figures to urge the American authorities to block the passage proposed by the start-up of a non-profit structure to a public performance company (PBC).
In a joint letter submitted to the lawyers general of California and Delaware on Tuesday evening, the group opposed this decision while echoing the concerns of Elon Musk, which fights against a legal battle in order to stop the conversion.
The signatories argue that the proposed restructuring would transfer control of the development of general artificial intelligence (AG) – IT systems with cognitive capacities equal to most humans – to a company motivated by profits.
They added that this contradicts the founding mission of Openai to ensure that AGE benefits all of humanity rather than “the private gain of any person”.
“I would like [OpenAI] To execute this mission instead of enriching their investors, ”said Hinton, a winner of the Nobel Prize and Professor at the University of Toronto.
The intervention draws more attention to the controversial plan of OpenAi to turn into a for -profit entity by the end of this year.
Without the change, the company based in San Francisco, directed by the director general Sam Altman, risks making part of its recent investments of $ 30 billion in softbank, as well as additional contributions from investors in the previous towers.
OPENAI, which is now estimated at $ 300 billion, argued that at a time when rivals such as Google and Meta invest hundreds of billions of dollars to develop technology, its investors “need conventional equity and less structural depth” to engage other capital.
But page Hedley, one of the former OpenAi employees, signed the letter opposing his conversion, said: “Competition is not the mission of Openai. According to all accounts, he has already managed to collect funds.”
He added: “Under the CBC, the Board of Directors would not have a fiduciary obligation towards the beneficiaries of the mission, the public … and if the board of directors does not fulfill its fiduciary obligation towards the shareholders, they would have recourse.”
Openai has a complex financial structure. In 2019, he created a for -profit subsidiary, which capped the yields for investors and gave its non -profit board of directors the total control of the for -profit branch.
Under the proposed changes, the non -profit board of directors would have participation in the for -profit entity and certain voting rights, but it would have a much more traditional investor structure.
“Our non -profit organization will be strengthened and any modification of our existing structure would be at the service to guarantee that the wider public can benefit from AI,” Openai said in a press release.
“This structure will continue to guarantee that, as the for-profit purpose succeeds and develops, the same goes for the non-profit organization, allowing us to reach the mission,” he added.
The lawyers general of California and Delaware, which have the authority over OpenAi’s decision are based and incorporated in their states, are responsible for ensuring that conversion is in the public interest and at a fair value.
The letter addressed to them argues that the structure of Openai was designed to balance market forces with its mission, and the proposed modifications would abandon these measures for financial pressures.
OPENAI previously warned that AGE would create a “serious risk of improper use, drastic accidents and societal disturbance”.
Altman signed a declaration in May 2023, which warned that “the attenuation of the risk of extinction of AI should be a global priority alongside other risks on a societal scale such as pandemics and nuclear war”.
“If Openai gave way control of its for -profit subsidiary, it would not only be a clear violation of its declared charitable objective … But that would also considerably increase the chances of what its own CEO described as” lights for all of us “,” said Russell, professor of computer science at the University of California in Berkeley.
