Comment by bigyabai
6 days ago
GPT is the product-ified version of text transformers, which OpenAI didn't invent or really even contribute to the discovery of.
The world changed with Attention is All You Need, and OpenAI was just an early adopter. The biggest thing OpenAI contributed to the broader industry was their API schema.
The researcher in me appreciates you pointing that out. Still, the people who invented a technology often aren't the ones to make it widespread. The people who make it widespread deserve at least some of the credit, just like Apple got with Xerox's UI. https://blog.prototypr.io/how-xerox-invented-ux-ui-design-ap...
OpenAI can slake themselves tumescent with credit, for all I care. I'm mostly alarmed by how many people think the LLM is OpenAI's invention, and completely misunderstood outside of their walls.
Sam's "we must control AGI" narrative in this post seemingly stems from an egoist attachment to the brand, and not any world-changing executive decisions that he could take credit for.
This sounds like the "acchhshually the iphone wasn't the first touchscreen phone, we had the motorola x34 vr34 t435 that did that one year before". Sure. Does anyone remember that phone? No? Well, the iphone changed the world.
The iPhone was the product-ized version of the smartphone. Smartphones were not a new technology, Apple's implementation of it in the iPhone is not unique. Web browsing, caller ID and MP3 playback were not new or world-changing features for a mobile phone.
"the iPhone changed the world" and "ChatGPT changed the world" are indeed both midwit takes that will get you mocked in technical circles. Both products have a net negative impact on technological progress and directly contribute to the enshittification of their respective market segments.