The Download: chaos at OpenAI, and the spa heated by bitcoin mining

—Niall Firth, executive editor, MIT Technology Review In 2019, Karen Hao, a senior reporter with MIT Technology Review, pitched me a story about a then little-known company, OpenAI. It was her biggest assignment to date. Hao’s feat of reporting took a series of twists and turns over the coming months, eventually revealing how OpenAI’s ambition had taken it far afield from its original mission. The finished story was a prescient look at a company at a tipping point—or already past it. And OpenAI was not happy with the result. Hao’s new book, Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI, is an in-depth exploration of the company that kick-started the AI arms race, and what that race means for all of us. This excerpt is the origin story of that reporting. This spa’s water is heated by bitcoin mining At first glance, the Bathhouse spa in Brooklyn looks not so different from other high-end spas. What sets it apart is out of sight: a closet full of cryptocurrency-­mining ... Read full article.