Leaked 2022 Email Reveals Sam Altman's Early Open Source Strategy

In an October 2022 email to the OpenAI board, Sam Altman outlined a strategic plan to release a language model with capabilities similar to GPT-3. The goal was to create a version of the technology that could run locally on consumer hardware rather than requiring massive cloud infrastructure.

Altman emphasized the importance of releasing this model quickly to beat competitors like Stability AI to the market. He argued that by providing a powerful, accessible model, OpenAI could effectively discourage other organizations from developing or releasing their own competing systems.

The strategy aimed to make it more difficult for new artificial intelligence startups to secure funding by saturating the market with OpenAI’s own technology. This internal communication highlights how the company viewed the release of open-source tools as a tactical move to maintain dominance and stifle the growth of potential rivals in the rapidly evolving AI industry.