> As of mid-August, Meta had successfully hired more than 20 researchers and engineers from OpenAI for the effort, at least 13 from Google, three from Apple, three from xAI and two from Anthropic for a total of 50-plus new employees.
What makes you think the secrets are small enough to fit inside people's heads, and aren't like a huge codebase of data scraping and filtering pipelines, or a DB of manual labels?
There has to be adverse selection here from the amount of money being offered right? Like ok, very few people could turn it down, but it's not going to result in a motivated team.
I am imagining all these overpaid founders etc just sitting in a room like reality show contestants. Trying to make smalltalk, brainstorm jamming for months, not really producing much because... who cares, they have unbelievable money and this is the weirdest scenario ever.
The pressure didn't come from investors. Investors expect Meta to increase capex by $30bn next year, a few engineers here or there is a rounding error in financial models.
This is a Bighead on the roof scenario. They aren't paying $250m to actually have $250m worth of work produced. They're paying it so that their competition doesn't have it.
If they are worth $250M to not work imagine how much they’d be worth if they said “screw that I’ll spin out my own company and license myself out.” I guess being paid a quarter billion to not work is hard to argue against though.
Gift link: https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/meta-ai-hiring-freeze-fda6b3c4?s...
Thanks for sharing.
Pretty aggressive paywall that is blocking archive.is and won't allow viewing a gift link without an account.
> won't allow viewing a gift link without an account.
Huh, that’s new. I didn’t realize they started doing that.
> As of mid-August, Meta had successfully hired more than 20 researchers and engineers from OpenAI for the effort, at least 13 from Google, three from Apple, three from xAI and two from Anthropic for a total of 50-plus new employees.
The rest of us look for cultural fit.
Meta already bought all openAI’s secrets; now it just needs to let the GPUs cook.
What makes you think the secrets are small enough to fit inside people's heads, and aren't like a huge codebase of data scraping and filtering pipelines, or a DB of manual labels?
When it is framed in this way the compensations are rational.
why do you need hiring when you have ai?
There has to be adverse selection here from the amount of money being offered right? Like ok, very few people could turn it down, but it's not going to result in a motivated team.
I am imagining all these overpaid founders etc just sitting in a room like reality show contestants. Trying to make smalltalk, brainstorm jamming for months, not really producing much because... who cares, they have unbelievable money and this is the weirdest scenario ever.
You’re assuming they’re not ambitious, self-motivated, or curious.
Usually things that go away with lots of money and corporate structure. I bet a good part of those new hires will land on the roof sooner or later.
Interesting that investors can pressure Meta this way. I assumed that since Zuck has the “power shares” he can overrule anyone?
The pressure didn't come from investors. Investors expect Meta to increase capex by $30bn next year, a few engineers here or there is a rounding error in financial models.
But I've always dreamed about being laid off for low performance by Meta.
Makes sense the payroll numbers of true are those of a 300+ person AI startup.
Surely Meta is going to be the company that turns LLMs into, not just AGI, but ASI.
Boy are they going to make that instagram feed fire.
You'd think instead of paying 1 really good engineer $250M you could pay 5 really good engineers $50M each.
This is a Bighead on the roof scenario. They aren't paying $250m to actually have $250m worth of work produced. They're paying it so that their competition doesn't have it.
I liked it better when companies were hoarding bootcamp grads.
If they are worth $250M to not work imagine how much they’d be worth if they said “screw that I’ll spin out my own company and license myself out.” I guess being paid a quarter billion to not work is hard to argue against though.
I'd be embarrassed to work for Meta or have it on my resume/CV
If you land a $250MM total comp package, you probably won’t need to worry about being embarrassed about what companies are on your resume.
Not exactly many make that even at crazy Meta. And now no one anymore will as they're ending their latest fad hiring.
Layoffs incoming?
without paywall: https://archive.is/20250821033002/https://www.wsj.com/tech/a...
Zuckerberg is like the billionaire version of the average Twitter idiot that jumps on the current memes, like crypto, NFTs, the metaverse, and now AI.
Sounds like another thing he stole from the Winklevoss twins.
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Lol. Meta has always been such a clownshow...
They have burnt $40B on metaverse fantasy!
Taxes are way too low
You don't think those employees and vendors' employees and/or vendors' shareholders paid taxes on their income, capital gains, and/or dividends?
Found the one guy who still believes in the "trickle-down economics" con.
Others can only hope their clown show is as successful:
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/META/meta-platform...