OpenAI, an artificial intelligence research organization, recently announced that in order to better fulfill its mission of creating and promoting friendly AI, it will restructure its governance structure and establish a board of directors consisting of five directors to oversee and guide OpenAI's strategy and operations. According to the new governance structure, OpenAI's CEO releases a new AI model, which needs to be unanimously approved by the board of directors to ensure that the new model meets OpenAI's values and ethical standards and does not cause harm to humans and society.
OpenAI is a non-profit AI research institute established in 2015 to ensure that the development of AI benefits all humanity and is not controlled or abused by a few people or organizations. The founders of OpenAI include Musk, Pete Thier, Kai-Fu Lee and other well-known technology figures, and its CEO is Sam Altman, former president of Y Combinator. OpenAI is known for its series of advanced AI models it has developed, such as GPT-3, DALL-E, CLIP, etc., which have shown amazing capabilities in natural language processing, image generation, computer vision, and other fields, which have attracted widespread attention and discussion.
However, with the continuous advancement of AI technology, it also brings some potential risks and challenges, such as the security, reliability, explainability, fairness, privacy, etc. of AI. In order to deal with these problems, OpenAI believes that it is necessary to adjust its governance structure, increase the supervision and checks and balances of its CEO to release new models, and prevent new models from being used for undesirable purposes or having an undesirable impact on humans and society. OpenAI said on its official blog that the adjustment is to ensure that OpenAI can stay true to its mission and contribute to the well-being and freedom of humanity.
Under the new governance structure, OpenAI will establish a board of directors consisting of five directors, three of whom are independent directors and two are internal directors. The independent directors are jointly elected by the founders and sponsors of OpenAI, and the internal directors are elected by the employees of OpenAI. The Board of Directors is chaired by an independent director and is currently held by former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. The responsibilities of the Board of Directors include:
Review and approve OpenAI's annual budget, strategic plan, major projects, and cooperation agreements, etc.;
Supervise and evaluate the performance and compensation of OpenAI's CEO and other senior management, etc
Review and approve the release of a new AI model by OpenAI's CEO to ensure that the new model meets OpenAI's values and ethical standards and does not cause harm to humans and society
Review and approve OpenAI's policies and procedures for risk management, internal control, compliance, auditing, etc.;Communicate and coordinate with external stakeholders such as **, the public, partners, etc. on behalf of OpenAI.
OpenAI's CEO Sam Altman welcomed the new governance structure, saying it is an important step in OpenAI's growth and maturity, as well as an important manifestation of OpenAI's mission and responsibility. He said he will work closely with the board of directors to jointly promote the development of OpenAI to create and promote friendly AI for humanity. He also said that he will continue to work on the development of more advanced and useful AI models, but will also follow the guidance and supervision of the board of directors to ensure the safety and reliability of the new models and avoid their misuse and misuse.