Lessig: Adopting 'Right to Warn' will give AI labs a talent advantage
Lawrence "Larry" Lessig · What The Ex-OpenAI Safety Employees Are Worried About · Jul 3, 2024 · at 43:54
Harvard Law professor Larry Lessig discusses how adopting whistleblower protections could impact hiring and product development dynamics at AI labs.
0:00 / 0:22exact quote · 22.7s
▶ Watch the full episode on YouTube → 720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“If a company were to embrace the right to warn the way we've discussed it there would be a lot of people like William or others who would say, that's the kind of company I want to work for. And so that company would achieve an advantage of talent that might, you know, swamp any cost that they're paying because they're being anxious about who they're sharing safety concerns with.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Lawrence "Larry" Lessig
Lessig: Ex-OpenAI Staff Remained Silent Fearing Equity Clawbacks
“I mean, I've spoken to ex-employees who've said, look, I've not done X, Y, and Z because I feared the club acts. So they can say, and they never enforced it. They didn't need to enforce it to have the effect, which it had for a significant number of people”
Lessig: California Law Treats Vested Equity as Unconditional Wages
“Equity Is wage in the state of California. If you earn equity, your vested equity, it's like your wages. And when you leave, they can't say, oh, here's a bunch of other additional agree terms you must agree to in order to take what you've already earned. So th…”
Lessig: Failing to Follow Stated AI Safety Regimes Is Reportable to SEC
“Some agencies like the SEC takes the view that most anything could potentially be the sort of thing you'd have privilege to complain to the SEC about because it could potentially affect the value of the company. And to the extent it's potentially affecting the…”
Lessig: 'Right to Warn' only allows public disclosure if reporting channels fail
“The right to warn we were talking about actually talked about creating an incentive so that no confidential information would be released to the public. If they had this structure, you know, imagine a portal again, where you can connect with the company and wi…”
Lessig: Federal AI whistleblower framework requires new legislation, not just FTC authority
“I mean, you know, agencies like the FTC believe they have lots of inherent jurisdiction that they could set up something that would be close to this, but the kind of thing that would convince people like William would require legislation the way California has…”