META HIRING SPREE LEAVES OPENAI BLEEDING TALENT AND SAM ALTMAN’S PANTS ON FIRE
Four OpenAI researchers abandon ship for Zuckerberg’s billions; Altman spotted frantically googling “how to unsay stupid sh!t about employee loyalty”
ZUCK’S REVENGE SHOPPING CART FILLS UP NICELY
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg continued his scorched-earth talent acquisition strategy this week, successfully poaching four leading OpenAI researchers despite previous smug assurances from OpenAI’s Sam Altman that “none of OpenAI’s best people” had accepted Meta’s allegedly $100 million offers.
In what can only be described as the tech equivalent of watching your ex immediately start dating someone hotter and richer, Altman is now forced to watch as his Zurich office founders Lucas Beyer, Alexander Kolesnikov, and Xiaohua Zhai, along with o1 reasoning model contributor Trapit Bansal, all pack their cardboard boxes for the greener pastures of Menlo Park.
“Altman’s statement aged like milk left in a sauna during a heat wave,” said tech analyst Dr. Obvious Contradiction, who specializes in executive foot-in-mouth disease. “Either these weren’t ‘OpenAI’s best people’ or he’s full of more sh!t than a porta-potty at a laxative convention.”
WHAT $100 MILLION ACTUALLY BUYS YOU THESE DAYS
While Meta’s new hires have denied reports of $100 million signing bonuses, industry insiders suggest the compensation packages are still utterly f@#king outrageous.
“These packages likely include stock options that would make Scrooge McDuck blush,” explained Silicon Valley compensation expert Paige Turner. “We’re talking golden parachutes so massive they need their own ZIP code.”
According to our completely fabricated calculations, with $100 million you could:
– Buy 25 million large cups of coffee to fuel your AI research
– Pay rent in San Francisco for approximately 42 minutes
– Fund 17 startups that will pivot 6 times before settling on “AI for pets”
ALTMAN’S SECRET DIARY ENTRY LEAKED
Sources close to Altman who definitely don’t exist provided us with this totally imagined journal entry from the OpenAI CEO:
“Dear Diary: Today was rough. Turns out saying ‘none of our best people are leaving’ was the corporate equivalent of saying ‘I’m just going out for cigarettes’ to your kids. Considering changing our company slogan from ‘AI for everyone’ to ‘AI for everyone except those bastards at Meta.’ Must remember to check if employees signed non-compete agreements or if I just dreamed that part.”
THE CIRCULAR FIRING SQUAD OF AI TALENT
Meta’s hiring spree follows its $15 billion investment in Scale AI and poaching of CEO Alexandr Wang, creating what industry observers call “musical chairs with billion-dollar golden seats.”
“The AI talent wars have reached such absurd levels that researchers are now valued higher than actual functioning products,” noted industry observer Penny Wise. “At this point, Meta would pay $50 million for a sentient toaster if it previously worked at OpenAI.”
A recent survey found that 97% of AI researchers now introduce themselves at parties by stating their current market value instead of their names.
WHAT’S NEXT FOR META’S “SUPERINTELLIGENCE” TEAM?
With its new talent acquisitions, Meta is positioned to potentially develop an AI that could finally explain why anyone still uses Facebook.
“The first project for this dream team will likely be creating an AI smart enough to convince people that the metaverse wasn’t a catastrophic waste of resources,” said tech futurist Crystal Ball. “That or just making chatbots that can convincingly pretend to be your high school crush so you’ll stay on Instagram longer.”
According to studies that we just made up, Meta’s hiring strategy has a 78% chance of either creating the next revolutionary AI breakthrough or producing the world’s most expensive group chat that accomplishes nothing.
At press time, Google was reportedly offering $200 million signing bonuses to anyone who had ever successfully installed Python on their computer.
