OpenAI is a strange company for strange times. Valued at $300 billion'roughly the same as seven Fords or one and a half PepsiCos'the AI start-up has an era-defining product in ChatGPT and is racing to be the first to build superintelligent machines. The company is also, to the apparent frustration of its CEO Sam Altman, beholden to its nonprofit status. When OpenAI was founded in 2015, it was meant to be a research lab that would work toward the goal of AI that is 'safe' and 'benefits all of humanity.' There wasn't supposed to be any pressure'or desire, really'to make money. Later, in 2019, OpenAI created a for-profit subsidiary to better attract investors'the types of people who might otherwise turn to the less scrupulous corporations that dot Silicon Valley. But even then, that part of the organization was under the nonprofit side's control. At the time, it had released no consumer products and capped how much money its investors could make. Then came ChatGPT. OpenAI's leadership...
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