Which number is bigger isn't the only calculation to make. Elon has shown himself to be a capricious and distracted steward of the companies he assumes control of. He has a lot of debt and is already over-leveraged on multiple companies as well as his new roles in government. X has plunged in value, Tesla sales are plummeting worldwide, Elon's scorched earth political agenda invites unending controversy that OpenAI already has enough of on its own. Even if you ignore those glaring concerns, there's a compelling argument to be made that OpenAI's current leadership has already proven itself more than capable of world-class innovation and vision when they effectively created an entirely new industry.
It wasn't long ago that the company almost fell apart because senior folks who actually care about the company tried to oust sama - the chaos that an Elon takeover would introduce is a critical risk that cannot be ignored.
"I'll pay you double" isn't the instant checkmate you're suggesting.
That may be all true. But maybe I'm not quite understanding the point or how it relates to Elon from the perspective of non-for-profit OpenAI. It could be "stranger X" and let me explain.
If the existing assets are worth $40b then for $97b as a board you could sell it, build another OpenAI (in fact you could build 2 new competitors) and still have change left over to pursue your mission. If your charter is to "produce lots of OpenAI accessible to everyone" this has to fit that mission - more AI competitors, more access to AI, etc. No matter what your feelings are of the characters in this story... by definition given their charter they have $40billion worth of assets (by their valuation) to achieve their mission - which includes the PV of all internal advantages/models/patents/etc they have developed. By accepting this deal they are ahead.
So:
- Either the assets are worth $40 billion and to further their charter they should take the deal (and by definition have more assets/firepower to do their mission) OR
- $40 billion is significantly undervalued which then raises other questions around governance, internal dealings, etc to try to convert to a for-profit by buying the non-profit's assets. If they go with the internal plan with the other deal on the table it could be argued as self-sabotage. I'm not sure of US law, but it could give rise to the validity of the deal legally. A non-profit converting to a profit is already a bit "hazy" from my understanding.
For as "obvious to everyone" as your point is supposed to be, it focuses entirely on what the offer means to OpenAI-P and zero on what it means to OpenAI-NP. The decision is to be made by an OpenAI-NP that can effectively divorce itself from OpenAI-P and in either case will be divorced from control of OpenAI-P. They can either have $40B in OpenAI equity or $97B.
In the scenario where they chose the $40B in OpenAI equity, they are eschewing $97B with which they can achieve their mission. They will be less effective by $57B. They still have no control over OpenAI in this context. They don't have control over OpenAI from the perspective of safety/benefit of humanity. All they have is $40B worth of equity.
Or, they can get $97B and go about completing their mission. In this case, what happens to OpenAI doesn't really matter. They lose control over OpenAI from the perspective of safety/public benefit in both cases, but in this case they get to deploy $97B of capital to their goals. The success of OpenAI-P is irrelevant to OpenAI-NP.
Now, maybe you would claim that there is some kind of existential risk from OpenAI-P being controlled by Elon. But if that's the case, how is Elon uniquely special? How does OpenAI prevent Elon from gaining control of OpenAI anyway when they won't have control to prevent it? How can they be sure Sam Altman is okay to lead when the board already removed him due his duplicity once. To eliminate their control OpenAI-P, they open themselves up to this same risk regardless. They can take that risk with either $40B of equity or $97B of cash.
> "I'll pay you double" isn't the instant checkmate you're suggesting.
This isn't what I suggest at all and I would've expected someone who sees through such complex issues to rationales that are "obvious to everyone" would've been able to see that. This does however pose real problems for OpenAI-P as they try to go private!
> > They can either have $40B in OpenAI equity or $97B.
> In other words: the big number trumps the small number - QED.
Yes those are words I used to describe a factual choice they have. Following that are a lot more words that dive deeper into that discussion. Here's how I summarized my initial point in the TL;DR on my ultimate parent post:
"Musk is trying to force OpenAI to value OpenAI-NP's stake in OpenAI-P at a reasonable level which is far greater than the current $40B which will help Musk by potentially derailing OpenAI-P's goal to be spun off.
For people with smooth brains like me, I'll helpfully point out how this doesn't present Elon's offer as "an instant checkmate." The first word to note is "trying." This suggests it is an attempt to do something that is not guaranteed to result in a win (ie a "checkmate"). The second word is "potentially" which again reinforces the case that this does not guarantee Elon achieves the stated goal (ie is not "checkmate").
> Why do you believe OpenAI-NP wouldn't care about all the issues I raised?
My prior post raised all sorts of reasons and you seem to have decided to ignore them to build strawmen.
> Here's how I summarized my initial point in the TL;DR on my ultimate parent post:
Yes. I responded directly to that comment, acknowledged it as interesting, but stated that there are obvious reasons why this fact - that you are building your entire argument around - isn't the primary concern in this transaction. In exchange, you offered me feigned disbelief that all the insanity surrounding Musk isn't totally distorting the economic incentives at play.
> Following that are a lot more words that dive deeper into that discussion
Following that are a lot more words saying the same thing over and over again:
> ...either $40B of equity or $97B of cash.
97 bigger than 40
> in the scenario where they chose the $40B in OpenAI equity, they are eschewing $97B with which they can achieve their mission
if they choose 40 they are eschewing 97 (which is bigger than 40)
> but in this case they get to deploy $97B of capital to their goals.
In this case, rather than having 40 to put towards their goals, they have 97, 97 of course being higher than 40.
> My prior post raised all sorts of reasons and you seem to have decided to ignore them to build strawmen.
It's not a strawman, it's essentially the only thing you've had to say this entire thread. If an executive order is passed to make 40 greater than 97 your entire argument completely dissipates.
LMAO you literally just removed every word about the incentives around control of OpenAI-P and are claiming it's not a strawman to say that the only thing I say is 97 > 40.
It's not a strawman, it's the crux of your argument. The rest is just hand-waving away the chaos that Musk represents for OpenAI P and NP so you can repeatedly frame this is a simple question of which number is bigger than the other - hence why you have to repeat it over and over again.
> how is Elon uniquely special
This is the part that is obvious to everyone, but I already offered a few reasons why. If you can't see them, then I think we're at an impasse.
X plunging in value is outdated information. EBITDA is double what it was when it was public ($682m to $1.25bn). Revenue is down, but profit is up substantially, due to aggressive cost management.
The advertising business is rising again, with Disney, Comcast and IBM back. [1]
If revenue is rising, with the new cost structure it'll be a cash machine. The doomers who claimed Twitter would collapse were plainly wrong, there's been one minor outage with dramatically reduced infra and employees.
It wasn't long ago that the company almost fell apart because senior folks who actually care about the company tried to oust sama - the chaos that an Elon takeover would introduce is a critical risk that cannot be ignored.
"I'll pay you double" isn't the instant checkmate you're suggesting.