One important detail in this report about Microsoft and OpenAI’s exclusive cloud arrangement is that last year’s extension apparently defines the often-disputed term artificial general intelligence (AGI).
While reaching AGI could let OpenAI end the deal, the report says that it’s defined as returning $100 billion or so in profits — a tall task for a company “with no path toward profitability in sight.”
We reported in October that OpenAI could launch its GPT-4 successor, codenamed Orion, this month. Now, The Wall Street Journal reports the behind-schedule model’s training is a struggle that’s racking up “enormous” costs.
When it will be ready is apparently a feel thing. WSJ writes:
It’s up to company executives to decide whether the model is smart enough to be called GPT-5 based in large part on gut feelings or, as many technologists say, “vibes.”
So far, the vibes are off.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman went on a Bari Weiss podcast recently and spoke about his ongoing feud with Elon Musk:
I don’t live inside Elon’s head, so this is a little bit of a speculation. Elon definitely did a lot to help OpenAI in the early days, and in spite of all this, I’m very grateful. And I think he’s just a sort of legendary entrepreneur.
He’s also clearly a bully, and he’s also someone who clearly likes to get in fights. Right now, it’s me. It’s been Bezos, Gates, Zuckerberg, lots of other people. And I think fundamentally, this is about OpenAI doing really well. Elon cares about doing really well. Elon started, and now runs, a very direct competitor that’s trying to do exactly what OpenAI does. Everything we’re doing, I believe Elon would be happy about if he were in control of the company.
OpenAI’s search leader Shivakumar Venkataraman, hired from Google just 7 months ago to lead the company’s search efforts, has departed with no explanation for his exit or succession plan, per The Information.
[The Information]
OpenAI’s 11th “ship-mas” drop: ChatGPT’s desktop app now works with Apple Notes, Notion, Quip, and some new coding apps.
CPO Kevin Weil calls it “agentic.” I tried it — it’s slow, and I don’t feel comfortable letting it access my private Notion stuff, but I could see it being useful for coding instead.
According to OpenAI’s status page, this issue has been going on for a few hours, even though user reports stretch back even further:
Some users may not receive verification emails for login or signup with username and password.
The most recent update note says that new users can still sign up using a Google, Microsoft, or Apple account, and when we tried logging in, after a few failed attempts, it stopped attempting to verify by email and logged in successfully.
