OpenAI is an American research organization primarily based on the development of artificial intelligence. Recent breakthroughs launched by OpenAI — notably ChatGPT and DALL-E — made headlines on news outlets. The organization was initially started as a non-profit venture in 2015 by tech visionaries such as Elon Musk and Sam Altman with the mission of allowing artificial intelligence technologies to develop into something that could benefit all of humanity. This was achieved through transparent collaboration with various research institutions, as well as through the publishing of OpenAI’s patents to the public.

Though OpenAI started off as non-profit, soon after the establishment of “OpenAI Limited Partnership” (OpenAI LP) in 2019, the organization welcomed a for-profit subsidiary, with the main goals of this step attempting to appeal towards investors as well as potential employees by offering stock options for the company. Through the profit, OpenAI obtained the capacity to do what other large tech firms like Facebook or Google were able to do prior. This also allowed the organization to increasingly appear as a viable career choice for job-seekers, easing the difficulties encountered when recruiting field experts to work for OpenAI. In an effort to maintain OpenAI’s original charter as a non-profit, OpenAI LP has introduced certain rules, including barring most of the board of directors holding a stake in the firm, while also not allowing minority stakeholders from contributing in select votes. Despite this, OpenAI has continued to receive backlash since then, with accusations that the organization is deviating away from their original claim that artificial intelligence should be something that is open to and that benefits everyone.

Most recently, OpenAI has made its claim to fame through the introduction of the Generative Pre-trained Transformer series, or more commonly referred to as GPT. The latest iteration of the  human-interactive natural language processing model, GPT-4, has proven itself to be a powerful asset towards a range of applications. With the advent of AI models like GPT or DALL-E, an AI art generator, OpenAI has adopted a more careful approach towards the balance between openly sharing all of its technology and the risks associated with the misuse of its research products. Despite these listed reasons, only time will tell whether something as influential and powerful as AI can be successfully harnessed by OpenAI while also sticking to their original commitments to “democratizing” the technology.