The "Merger" That Wasn't (and Never Would Be)
So, OpenAI and Anthropic almost merged? Give me a freakin' break. According to court docs from the Musk lawsuit, Ilya Sutskever said there were "talks" after Altman's little boardroom drama back in November 2023. Talks that lasted "extremely briefly" and petered out because of "practical obstacles." OpenAI debated merging with one of its biggest rivals after firing Sam Altman, court docs reveal
Right.
Let's be real: This wasn't some serious negotiation. This was Anthropic, smelling blood in the water, making a power play while OpenAI was momentarily stumbling. It’s like seeing your neighbor trip on the sidewalk and immediately offering to "help" by taking over their house.
And Sutskever being "very unhappy" about it? Color me shocked. The guy clearly had his own vision for OpenAI, and I doubt that vision involved handing the keys over to Dario and Daniela Amodei.
The article says Helen Toner was the "most supportive" of the merger. I wonder what that means. Was she genuinely trying to save the company, or did she just want to stick it to Altman? We'll probably never know the full story there, will we?
Musk vs. Altman: The Neverending Soap Opera
Speaking of Altman, let's not forget the sideshow that is his ongoing feud with Elon Musk. "You stole a non-profit," Musk tweeted. "I helped turn the thing you left for dead into what should be the largest non-profit ever," Altman shot back.
These guys are like two toddlers fighting over a toy, except the toy is the future of artificial intelligence and the stakes are, you know, everything.
Musk's lawsuit, accusing OpenAI of betraying its founding mission, is particularly rich coming from a guy who's building freakin' spaceships and trying to put chips in our brains. Is that freely available for the good of mankind? I highly doubt it.
And OpenAI countersuing Musk for a "years-long campaign of harassment"? It’s like watching two multi-billionaires air their dirty laundry on Twitter. You almost feel bad for them...almost.
Almost makes you miss the good old days of simple corporate greed. Remember when it was just about money? Now it's about ego, world domination, and passive-aggressive tweets.
I wonder, does anyone at OpenAI or Anthropic ever just sit down and think, "Maybe we should focus on building useful AI instead of engaging in this ridiculous power struggle?"
Forward-Deployed Engineers: The New Hotness?
Oh, and I almost forgot the other "news" item: AI companies are apparently scrambling to hire "forward-deployed engineers." These are the folks who embed themselves with clients to figure out what they actually need.
One company said, “We learn what customers in different industries really need, we experiment and innovate together, and then those insights help advance OpenAI’s research and product offerings based on what works in the real world.”
Translation: "We have no idea what people want, so we're sending engineers to spy on them."
It's product discovery from the inside, they say. Or, as I like to call it, corporate reconnaissance.
“[Forward-deployed engineers] know that the only valuable software is not how exquisite its code is or how beautiful the language . . . It’s only valuable if it means something for the end customer.”
Wow. Profound. It only took them a decade and a half to realize that software should actually be useful. Offcourse, now they need special engineers to figure that out.
This Whole Thing Smells Fishy...
So, what's the real story here? A failed merger attempt, a billionaire pissing match, and a sudden interest in customer needs. It all feels a bit too convenient, don't you think? Like someone's trying to distract us from something else... But what?
