Comment by jsnell
3 hours ago
These were evaluations or training runs dealing with the ability to do web searches. The entire reason the bots were targeting this site is that it had some of the data they'd been tasked with finding. Access to the internet is not really optional for that, and providing internet access doesn't demonstrate neglicence.
> This is why it smells like marketing
It doesn't. "Our product commits felonies" is not marketing. If something is marketing, you don't engage in repeated coverups of the true extent. If something is good news, you don't release it on a Friday evening (in this case) or wait for 3rd parties to find and publicize the evidence (the past cases).
> The entire reason the bots were targeting this site is that it had some of the data they'd been tasked with finding.
so openai specifically tasked the agents with meddling in US government websites?
id say tasking them with getting data from there as swapping from negligence to malice.
No. They tasked them with answering questions by retrieving data from public sources. This obviously requires internet access. So the incredulity about "how could they fail to block internet access" is just inane. That was the task.
They did not task the agents with hacking into systems. Not monitoring for that was a mistake, but maybe a forgivable one the first time around. The subsequent coverups are inexcusable.
Usually also, and more so nowadays, a few of the public sources of data left, even after the recent USGov intention of defund and close as much of them as possible, im guessing would be precisely, government websites!
> It doesn't. "Our product commits felonies" is not marketing.
Oh, absolutely it is. Arms manufacturers always go on about the efficiency of the weapons they create and make no mistake: OpenAI is first and foremost a weapons manufacturer, the rest is just a fig leaf. The fact that you aren't the audience for purchases like that makes no difference. "Look at this capability, and that's when we're not even trying." is pretty good marketing in some circles.
Yes, famously tobacco companies wanted to advertise their products as addictive and deadly. That's why they funded and heavily publicized research to that effect.
Climate change is just a scam by the fossil fuel industry to hype up their market cap. Look at the power of co2, and the damage it can do without even trying.
Medicines being pulled during trials or after public availability for side effects are just Big Pharma making their products more desirable via scarcity.
Boeing did really well out of the 737 max. Airlines were just lining up to buy an airplane that could give the passengers an experience they would remember for the rest of their life. That's why they absolutely made clear that it was their product that was dangerous, rather than blaming operator error.
Naive take. The more they signal to both the general populace and their investors that their agents are sentient and "capable of extraordinary things" the more they can hype their IPO because it means they're "close to AGI". (They're not, which is why they need the hype.)
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Oh look - it’s one of those “created one minute ago” accounts again.
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