Our board, with support from the controlling long-term benefit trust (LTBT) and outside partners, forms the third line in the three lines of defense model, providing an independent perspective on any key safety decisions from people who were not involved in the development or execution of our plans. They are ultimately responsible for signing off on high-stakes decisions, like deployments of new frontier models.
Someone suggested that I point out that this is misleading. The board is not independent: it’s two executives, one investor, and one other guy. And the board has the hard power here, modulo the LTBT’s ability to elect/replace board members. And the LTBT does not currently have AI safety expertise. And Dario at least is definitely “involved in the development or execution of our plans.”
(I’m writing this comment because I believe it, but with this disclaimer because it’s not the highest-priority comment from my perspective.)
There are I think also the undisclosed conditions under which investors could override decisions by the LTBT. Or maybe we have now learned about those conditions, but if so, I haven’t seen it, or have forgotten about it.
Article IV of the Certificate of Incorporation lists the number of shares of each class of stock, and as that’s organized by funding round I expect that you could get a fair way by cross-referencing against public reporting.
Yes for one mechanism. It’s unclear but it sounds like “the Trust Agreement also authorizes the Trust to be enforced by the company and by groups of the company’s stockholders who have held a sufficient percentage of the company’s equity for a sufficient period of time” describes a mysterious separate mechanism for Anthropic/stockholders to disempower the trustees.
Someone suggested that I point out that this is misleading. The board is not independent: it’s two executives, one investor, and one other guy.
As of November this year, the board will consist of the CEO, one investor representative, and three members appointed by the LTBT. I think it’s reasonable to describe that as independent, even if the CEO alone would not be, and to be thinking about the from-November state in this document.
(The LTBT got the power to appoint one board member in fall 2023, but didn’t do so until May. It got power to appoint a second in July, but hasn’t done so yet. It gets power to appoint a third in November. It doesn’t seem to be on track to make a third appointment in November.)
(And the LTBT might make non-independent appointments, in particular keeping Daniela.)
Someone suggested that I point out that this is misleading. The board is not independent: it’s two executives, one investor, and one other guy. And the board has the hard power here, modulo the LTBT’s ability to elect/replace board members. And the LTBT does not currently have AI safety expertise. And Dario at least is definitely “involved in the development or execution of our plans.”
(I’m writing this comment because I believe it, but with this disclaimer because it’s not the highest-priority comment from my perspective.)
(Edit: I like and appreciate this post.)
There are I think also the undisclosed conditions under which investors could override decisions by the LTBT. Or maybe we have now learned about those conditions, but if so, I haven’t seen it, or have forgotten about it.
(If they’re sufficiently unified, stockholders have power over the LTBT. The details are unclear. See my two posts on the topic.)
Ah, yeah, the uncertainty is now located in who actually has how much stock. I did forget that we now do at least know the actual thresholds.
Article IV of the Certificate of Incorporation lists the number of shares of each class of stock, and as that’s organized by funding round I expect that you could get a fair way by cross-referencing against public reporting.
Yes for one mechanism. It’s unclear but it sounds like “the Trust Agreement also authorizes the Trust to be enforced by the company and by groups of the company’s stockholders who have held a sufficient percentage of the company’s equity for a sufficient period of time” describes a mysterious separate mechanism for Anthropic/stockholders to disempower the trustees.
As of November this year, the board will consist of the CEO, one investor representative, and three members appointed by the LTBT. I think it’s reasonable to describe that as independent, even if the CEO alone would not be, and to be thinking about the from-November state in this document.
(The LTBT got the power to appoint one board member in fall 2023, but didn’t do so until May. It got power to appoint a second in July, but hasn’t done so yet. It gets power to appoint a third in November. It doesn’t seem to be on track to make a third appointment in November.)
(And the LTBT might make non-independent appointments, in particular keeping Daniela.)