At a company-wide meeting of all employees on Thursday, Meta’s top executives answered questions about the “$100,000,000 signing bonuses” that openai Sam Altman ( ) claimed they were offering to poach Meta’s employees.
Andrew Bosworth, Meta’s CTO said, “Sam’s just being dishonest,” Sam Altmanduring the meeting. “He’s saying that we’re doing it for everyone… Look, you guys, this market is hot.” It’s not really that hot.
Since Altman mentioned the “$100 million” bonus on his brother’s podcast, the headline has become a social media meme. Bosworth told Meta’s employees today that Sam fails to mention that he is countering all of these offers and creating a small, small market for people who are interested in senior, senior leadership positions” within the new superintelligence AI Meta team. “That’s not what happens in the AI space.” He’s also not mentioning the terms of the offer. It’s not a [a] signing-on bonus. It’s all of these different things. “He’s very unhappy about that.” Bosworth told the audience, “For all of the new bootcampers present, you did not screw up.” The audience laughed and clapped. “You made a great decision. Bosworth was not the only Meta executive to mention OpenAI at the internal meeting. CPO Chris Cox (19459052) also acknowledged that while Meta AI had one billion monthly users engagement “isn’t nearly as deep as how people are using ChatGPT.” He told employees that the standalone Meta AI app only has 450,000 daily users and that “a lot of these folks” use it to manage their Ray-Ban Meta sunglasses. Cox told employees that they would not be going after ChatGPT to improve the way you write emails at work. “We must differentiate ourselves by not focusing on productivity obsessively, as Anthropic, OpenAI and Google do. We’re going focus on entertainment, connection with friends, how people live their life, and all of the other things that we do uniquely well. This is a major part of our strategy moving forward.
Meta refused to comment on the meeting.
You versus io
I spoke to Jason Rugolo on Thursday and wanted to know why he was suing the most powerful company in tech.
Rugolo’s AI device startup Iyo recently won a temporary injunction that bars OpenAI’s Sam Altman’s hardware division from using the “io” brand. Altman responded on his X account by claiming that Rugolo had filed the trademark lawsuit because OpenAI refused investment in or purchase of Iyo. Iyo is gearing up for its first AI powered in-ear headphones to be released later this year.
Rugolo admits (and court documents confirm) that he pitched Altman multiple times on investing. He also discussed a possible acquisition with members of the io team this year. He says that his lawsuit is not a revenge campaign, but merely a way to clear up any confusion about his upcoming release. Altman’s io. and Iyo One headphones (19459056).
While trademark lawsuits are common, this one is notable for its success. There is intense interest in the project Altman and Ive have been working on (apparently, the first device won’t be a “wearable” or “in-ear product”), and this case is a Rorschach Test for how you feel towards Altman. He is certainly polarizing. Rugolo tells Rugolo, “I had a huge change in opinion about the guy.” “I was under the spell that Sam Altman was a great entrepreneur, and a very interesting person. This broke almost immediately after their public announcement. [of io]”
“Am I getting screwed? Rugolo remembers thinking. “This is not a case of stolen technology or ideas,” OpenAI spokesperson Kayla said in a shared statement with me. “Iyo demoed in May 2025 a product that did not function properly or meet our standard in hopes that we would acquire Iyo. We passed. Jason Rugolo also knew the io brand and never raised any concerns before our announcement.”
Rugolo claims that Iyo will be able to survive until the end of 2026 thanks to the millions he raised recently from Pegatron and a billionaire he won’t name. When I ask him if the device that he teased in is the one he teased, he says no. He hopes that OpenAI “put their guns down” and “complete as grown-ups with product.”
As he prepares to go through legal discovery and take his case before a court, he hopes they will “complete like adults on product.”
I will meet them at the market, he tells. “We’ll both try to launch cool stuff and see if our customers can benefit from it.” They’ll compete fairly and stop using their name. Apparently, they have some of the world’s best designers. You can think of a different name. You can’t just use the name I told you already and that I have been using since 2019″
AI will soon be in games
Runway has been known to bring generative AI into Hollywood. The $3 billion startup has now set its sights on gaming. Runway CEO Cristobal Valenzuela ( ) told me that they plan to make the new interactive gaming experience available to everyone next week. Valenzuela said that the consumer-facing product, which is currently barebones with a chat interface, will be able to generate video games later this year. He said that Runway was also in discussions with gaming companies to use its technology and access their datasets for the training. Valenzuela, based on recent conversations with Hollywood, believes that the gaming industry is similar to Hollywood’s position when generative AI was first introduced. Over time, AI was gradually integrated into more aspects of the production process. Valenzuela said that if his company can help a film studio make a movie 40% faster, they will be able to make games faster. “They’re waking-up, and they’re going faster than the studios did two years ago,” Valenzuela says. Recent acquisition talks between Zuckerberg and the company: “I believe we have more intellectual challenges being independent and remaining independent for the moment.”
In openai
no one knows what AGI means. This excellent article makes it clear what AGI actually means. Deep dive from The Information ( ) into Microsoft’s agreement with OpenAI. This is the most comprehensive, detailed piece I’ve ever seen on the negotiations between these two companies. Microsoft will lose exclusive access to OpenAI IP if the AI reaches “sufficient AGI”which is defined contractually as when OpenAI board determines the AI has the “capability to generate” maximum profits to its investors. OpenAI does not have to generate these profits.
OpenAI announced two deals this week that were under the radar. The first is an The first is a deal with Applied Intuition (19459056) to “advance the next-generation, AI powered experiences in vehicles.” Crossing Minds (19459056) is an AI startup which helped ecommerce companies provide more personalized product recommendations. “Joining OpenAI’s research group to focus on agents, information retrieval and other topics is a unique honour,” Crossing Minds founder Alexandre Eobicque. Writes “These are the problems that I’ve always been passionately interested in: how systems can learn, reason and retrieve knowledge at a large scale, in real time.”
Personnel Log
Some Interesting Career Moves in Tech:
- Three founders of OpenAI’s Zurich research office, Lucas Beyer, Alexander Kolesnikov, And Xiaohua Zhai,””https://x.com/giffmana/status/1938299990922674352″”> Meta has confirmed that they are joining Meta. Beyer writes: “No, we didn’t get 100M sign on, that is fake news.” Trapit Bansal (19459051) is a former OpenAI research who “started Ilya Suksekerthe RL for Reasoning effort” and co-created o1 model. Meta’s new lab is also a part of the
- Elon Musk initiative. Elon Musk
- is reorganizing Tesla. He Jenna Ferrua is the HR leader of Omead his longtime fixer, and head manufacturing. Jenna Ferrua, the HR leader is Also outNate Mitchell (19459052) has been a part of the team since 19659041. He will be the chief product officer at Seasame.
- Databricks Alan Davidson (19459052) the former assistant secretary of commerce for the NTIA was hired as the head of government affairs.
Link List
More links to click on:
Anthropic has published research on how people use Claude to provide emotional supportOpenAI should do more research like this. OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Brad Lightcap appeared on the Hard Fork podcastlive. The beginning of the conversation was both fun and awkward to watch.
Menlo Ventures’s view on consumer AI
Inside Silicon Valley’s anti college movement.
Venice prepares for the wedding of Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez this weekend.
I welcome your feedback as always. You can either respond here or send me a secure Signal message.
Thank you for subscribing.
AI will soon be in games
Runway has been known to bring generative AI into Hollywood. The $3 billion startup has now set its sights on gaming. Runway CEO Cristobal Valenzuela ( ) told me that they plan to make the new interactive gaming experience available to everyone next week. Valenzuela said that the consumer-facing product, which is currently barebones with a chat interface, will be able to generate video games later this year. He said that Runway was also in discussions with gaming companies to use its technology and access their datasets for the training. Valenzuela, based on recent conversations with Hollywood, believes that the gaming industry is similar to Hollywood’s position when generative AI was first introduced. Over time, AI was gradually integrated into more aspects of the production process. Valenzuela said that if his company can help a film studio make a movie 40% faster, they will be able to make games faster. “They’re waking-up, and they’re going faster than the studios did two years ago,” Valenzuela says. Recent acquisition talks between Zuckerberg and the company: “I believe we have more intellectual challenges being independent and remaining independent for the moment.”
In openai
no one knows what AGI means. This excellent article makes it clear what AGI actually means. Deep dive from The Information ( ) into Microsoft’s agreement with OpenAI. This is the most comprehensive, detailed piece I’ve ever seen on the negotiations between these two companies. Microsoft will lose exclusive access to OpenAI IP if the AI reaches “sufficient AGI”which is defined contractually as when OpenAI board determines the AI has the “capability to generate” maximum profits to its investors. OpenAI does not have to generate these profits.
OpenAI announced two deals this week that were under the radar. The first is an The first is a deal with Applied Intuition (19459056) to “advance the next-generation, AI powered experiences in vehicles.” Crossing Minds (19459056) is an AI startup which helped ecommerce companies provide more personalized product recommendations. “Joining OpenAI’s research group to focus on agents, information retrieval and other topics is a unique honour,” Crossing Minds founder Alexandre Eobicque. Writes “These are the problems that I’ve always been passionately interested in: how systems can learn, reason and retrieve knowledge at a large scale, in real time.”
Personnel Log
Some Interesting Career Moves in Tech:
- Three founders of OpenAI’s Zurich research office, Lucas Beyer, Alexander Kolesnikov, And Xiaohua Zhai,””https://x.com/giffmana/status/1938299990922674352″”> Meta has confirmed that they are joining Meta. Beyer writes: “No, we didn’t get 100M sign on, that is fake news.” Trapit Bansal (19459051) is a former OpenAI research who “started Ilya Suksekerthe RL for Reasoning effort” and co-created o1 model. Meta’s new lab is also a part of the
- Elon Musk initiative. Elon Musk
- is reorganizing Tesla. He Jenna Ferrua is the HR leader of Omead his longtime fixer, and head manufacturing. Jenna Ferrua, the HR leader is Also outNate Mitchell (19459052) has been a part of the team since 19659041. He will be the chief product officer at Seasame.
- Databricks Alan Davidson (19459052) the former assistant secretary of commerce for the NTIA was hired as the head of government affairs.
Link List
More links to click on:
I welcome your feedback as always. You can either respond here or send me a secure Signal message.
