OpenAI sends internal memo to release former employees from confidentiality agreements | Wilnesh News

OpenAI on Thursday walked back a controversial decision that effectively gave former employees the choice of signing non-disparagement agreements that never expired or retaining their vested stakes in the company.

The internal memo, seen by CNBC, was sent to former employees and shared with current employees.

The memo to each former employee says that when that person left OpenAI, “you may have been informed that you were required to sign a general release agreement containing a non-disparagement clause in order to retain the vested interest” in the unit. “

“Regardless of whether you signed the agreement or not, we are writing to inform you that OpenAI has not and will not cancel any vested units,” the memo, seen by CNBC, said.

OpenAI also will not enforce any other non-disparagement or non-solicitation terms of any contract the employee may have signed, the memo said.

“As we have shared with our employees, we are making important updates to our offboarding process,” an OpenAI spokesperson told CNBC in a statement.

“We have not and will never divest vested equity, even if people do not sign separation documents. We will remove the non-disparagement clause from our standard separation documents, and we will relieve former employees of their existing non-disparagement obligations unless the non-disparagement clause is Mutual,” the statement said, adding that former employees would also be informed of this.

An OpenAI spokesperson added: “We are deeply sorry that we are simply changing this language at this time; it does not reflect our values ​​or the company we want to be.”

Bloomberg The release of the non-disparagement clause was first reported. Walkers The existence of NDA clauses was first reported.

The news comes amid growing controversy over OpenAI over the past week or so.

On Monday, a week after OpenAI launched a series of ChatGPT audio voices, the company announced that it would be removing one of the viral chatbot’s voices, called “Sky.”

“Sky” sparked controversy due to its resemblance to the voice of actress Scarlett Johansson in the artificial intelligence film “Her.” The Hollywood star claims OpenAI stole her voice, even though she refused to let them use it.

“We’ve heard questions about how we select sounds in ChatGPT, especially Sky,” Microsoft-Supported companies publish on X.

Also last week, a person familiar with the matter confirmed to CNBC on Friday that OpenAI had disbanded a team focused on the long-term risks of artificial intelligence, a year after it was announced.

The person, who spoke to CNBC on condition of anonymity, said some team members are being reassigned to multiple other teams within the company.

The news comes days after two team leaders, OpenAI co-founders Ilya Sutskever and Jan Leike, announced their departure. Leike wrote on Friday that OpenAI’s “safety culture and processes have given way to shiny products.”

Open artificial intelligence Super Alignment TeamThe company, founded last year, focuses on “scientific and technological breakthroughs to guide and control artificial intelligence systems that are smarter than us.” At the time, OpenAI said it would devote 20% of its computing power to the initiative within four years.

The company has not commented publicly, referring CNBC to its co-founder and CEO Sam Altman’s latest posts On X, he said he was sad to see Lake leave and that the company had more work to do.

On Saturday, OpenAI co-founder Posted by Greg Brockman A statement from himself and Altman on