Good day everyone,
I hope you are all well and had an excellent week, welcome to CryptoGod-1’s blog on all things crypto. In this post I will be looking at the surprising news which emerged of Sam Altman leaving his role at OpenAi, and the impact it had on the WorldCoin "WLD" token.
Sam Altman‘s departure from OpenAI
On Friday the 17th of November 2023 it was announced that Sam Altman, the co-founder of WorldCoin alongside Max Novendstern and Alex Blania in 2019, was removed from his position as CEO of OpenAI due to his alleged lack of candid communication which impacted the responsibilities of the board. It was experienced like an earthquake in Silicon Valley, with the news spreading around like a wildfire.
As part of a blog post released on Friday, the board announced their decision to relieve Altman, noting:
“The board no longer has confidence in his ability to continue leading OpenAI."
The impact of the leadership shakeup had far reaching consequences, with president Greg Brockman announcing his resignation due to the CEO's ousting, which came just hours after Brockman had been demoted from the board he had previously chaired. Three more senior researchers are believed to have followed suit before the end of the day, with Chief technology officer Mira Murati named as interim CEO while the company conducts their formal search for a new leader.
With such monumental changes taking place, many questions have arisen regarding the companies future given its unique structure that gives limited power to even its biggest shareholders. The company has remained quiet on matters, with no details emerging from within and both Altman and Brockman merely noting the timeline of their notification and little else on the matter.
The company is believed to hold some of the most powerful technology in the history of the world as part of its Orbs. These devices scan human beings eyes to allocate them a World Identification, meaning it aims to authenticate human identity online in a bid to stop bots and fake identities. Users who partook int he process would receive Worldcoin tokens in return from a scan of their iris, which was inspired by a universal basic income mechanism.
Up till now it had been Altman dealing with Congress and governments around world as the face and voice of this AI venture, and many are speculating that Altman could make a public announcement to outline his intentions and now moves.
OpenAI operates within an investment model, and one of their biggest collaborators and investor in its for-profit arm is Microsoft. The company is said to have only learned of the move a minute before the public announcement. The CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, noted that the company remains committed to OpenAI.
Microsoft could be facing some PR issues due to this move, as the company is reported to have invested $13 billion into OpenAI's for-profit arm, but they did so without earning any board seat or any other legal mechanism to exercise influence. Moreover, the OpenAI project is governed by its non-profit entity's board and not its for-profit board, meaning the company is not facing a group of directors solely focused on shareholder value.
On the flip side Microsoft have already managed to benefit from OpenAI's tech without having to take responsibility for governance choices or other moves thus far. While this is a benefit to their agreement, one will also need to consider the fact venture capitalists paying top dollar for shares in the for-profit arm are, first and foremost, in the business of financial returns.
Along with Microsoft, there are a number of blue-chip investors, based on news announcements and media reports, which have put their faith in OpenAI. Among them are:
- Sequoia Capital
- Andreessen Horowitz
- Founders Fund
- Thrive Capital
- Y Combinator
- Bedrock Capital
- Tiger Global
- Khosla Ventures
For now OpenAI will continue with their stand of the non-profit, bettering-humanity aspect of OpenAI's structure and their aim to create a safer AI for humanity. The idea is noble, but the execution has been rife with problems and controversy. With Altman now leaving his position, it remains to be seen how far the project can go.
WorldCoin Impact
As for the WorldCoin token, WLD, it has seen a sharp decline in value since the news broke. Its all time high was capped at $3.30 back when the project emerged from Beta last July. The company recorded a week high price of $2.48 on Thursday, but by the end of Friday it had reached its lowest price in the week at a mere $1.84. The token is currently back trading around the $2.00 mark.
The wider AI coins and token category within the crypto space has not been hit in the same way by Altman's exit. The AI coin market cap, as defined by CoinGecko, has grown by 52.7% over the last seven days to reach a market capitalization of $5.95 billion.
The global intrigue will remain for now as the controversy remains. Last year a MIT Technology Review published an article claiming that the project had made use of “deception, exploited workers, and cash handouts” to reach its first 500,000 users. On top of that many government regulations, such as the U.K., Germany, France, Argentina, and Kenya, have raised concerns about privacy, security, and financial implications.
Kenya have even gone as far as suspending WorldCoin within their nation. Back in August a raid was undertaken on a WorldCoin warehouse from the Nairobi police in collaboration with officials from various agencies. They claimed their aim was to thoroughly investigate the legality of Worldcoin’s activities, safeguarding the data collected and its proposed utilization.
In Argentina they have launched a probe into Worldcoin to determine the legality of its data collection practices within the South American nation via the Argentine Agency for Access to Public Information (AAIP).
Have a great day,
Peace. CryptoGod-1.
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