OpenAI whistleblower Suchir Balaji found dead in US apartment
San Francisco: Suchir Balaji, a former Artificial Intelligence (AI) researcher at OpenAI, was found dead in his Buchanan Street apartment on November 26. The 26-year-old, who reportedly died by suicide, was known for his criticisms of OpenAI’s practices and his allegations of copyright violations by the company.
The San Francisco Police Department stated that their initial investigation found no evidence of foul play. Balaji had worked with OpenAI from November 2020 to August 2024, as per his LinkedIn profile.
Billionaire Elon Musk, who has had a contentious relationship with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, responded cryptically to the news on X (formerly Twitter) with a post that simply read "hmm."
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 14, 2024
In October, Balaji had publicly accused OpenAI of breaching copyright laws and criticised generative AI products like ChatGPT for potentially harming the internet and violating fair use principles. Speaking to The New York Times, he urged others to leave the company if they shared his beliefs.
In a detailed blog post, Balaji had dissected the fair use doctrine, arguing that ChatGPT and similar products do not pass the four-factor test for fair use, especially in their impact on the market value of copyrighted works. He noted, "None of the four factors seem to weigh in favour of ChatGPT being a fair use of its training data."
Balaji was involved in AI research for four years, including work on ChatGPT for a year and a half. He had raised concerns about generative AI substituting original data, leading to legal and ethical questions. His public statements had sparked discussions on the implications of generative AI on copyright and internet use.
I recently participated in a NYT story about fair use and generative AI, and why I'm skeptical "fair use" would be a plausible defense for a lot of generative AI products. I also wrote a blog post (https://t.co/xhiVyCk2Vk) about the nitty-gritty details of fair use and why I…
— Suchir Balaji (@suchirbalaji) October 23, 2024
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Bill to set up single higher education regulator likely to be tabled in Parliament next week
New Delhi (PTI): A Bill which seeks to set up a single regulator for institutions of higher education is required to facilitate universities and other higher educational institutes become independent and self-governing, officials said.
The Bill is likely to be introduced in Parliament next week after it got the Union Cabinet's nod on Friday.
The proposed legislation, which was earlier christened the Higher Education Commission of India (HECI) Bill, has now been named Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhikshan Bill.
A single higher education regulator, which was proposed in the new National Education Policy (NEP), looks to replace the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE).
"The Bill proposes to set up a Higher Education Commission of India to facilitate universities and other higher educational institutes become independent and self-governing institutions and to promote excellence through a robust and transparent system of accreditation and autonomy. It is likely to be introduced (in Parliament) in the coming week," an official said.
While the UGC presently oversees non-technical higher education in the country, the AICTE oversees technical education, while the NCTE is the regulatory body for teachers' education.
The Commission is proposed to be set up as a single higher education regulator, but medical and law colleges will not be brought under its ambit.
It is proposed to have three major roles -- regulation, accreditation and setting professional standards, officials said.
Funding, which is seen as the fourth vertical, is not proposed to be under the regulator so far. The autonomy for funding is proposed to be with the administrative ministry, they said.
