内容来源：https://techcrunch.com/2025/10/01/openai-staff-grapples-with-the-companys-social-media-push/

内容总结：

（本报讯）人工智能巨头OpenAI近日正式进军社交媒体领域，推出抖音风格的视频应用Sora，但其内部员工对这项新产品与公司“造福人类”的非营利使命是否契合产生激烈争论。

这款充满AI生成视频和山姆·奥特曼深度伪造内容的应用程序，引发了现任和前任研究人员的公开质疑。OpenAI预训练研究员约翰·霍尔曼在社交媒体坦言“AI信息流令人担忧”，但相信团队已尽力打造积极体验。哈佛教授博阿兹·巴拉克则指出，尽管Sora技术惊艳，但现在庆祝其规避深度伪造等风险为时过早。

前员工罗汉·潘迪更借此机会为旗下新创公司Periodic Labs招贤纳士，直言“若不想打造无限推送的AI短视频机器，而希望开发推动基础科学突破的AI，欢迎加入我们”。

这起争议凸显了OpenAI长期面临的核心矛盾：作为全球增长最快的消费科技公司，它既要追逐商业利益，又肩负着非营利的崇高使命。首席执行官奥特曼辩称，开发Sora既能展示前沿技术，又能为耗资巨大的通用人工智能研究筹措资金。但加州总检察长罗布·邦塔已明确表示，将密切关注该公司在架构调整中是否坚守安全使命。

与注重实用性的ChatGPT不同，Sora明确以娱乐化为定位，这使其更接近以成瘾性著称的短视频平台。尽管OpenAI承诺将通过发送使用提醒、优先展示熟人内容等方式规避风险，但用户已发现应用内设有点赞动态表情等旨在提升参与度的设计。

在人工智能原生信息流可能迎来爆发的当下，OpenAI能否在拓展商业版图的同时，避免重蹈传统社交媒体的覆辙，将成为检验其使命初心的试金石。

中文翻译：

数名现任及前任OpenAI研究员针对公司首次涉足社交媒体领域公开发声：这款名为Sora的应用程序采用类似TikTok的信息流模式，充斥着AI生成视频和大量山姆·奥特曼的深度伪造内容。研究人员在X平台表达忧虑时，对这款产品如何契合OpenAI"开发造福人类先进AI"的非营利使命表现出矛盾心态。

OpenAI预训练研究员约翰·霍尔曼在X平台发文称："AI驱动信息流令人不安。得知我们将发布Sora2时，我必须承认自己感到担忧。但团队在设计积极用户体验方面已竭尽所能...我们将全力确保AI助力而非伤害人类。"

另一位OpenAI研究员、哈佛大学教授博阿兹·巴拉克回应道："我同样怀揣忧虑与兴奋的复杂情绪。Sora2在技术上令人惊叹，但现在庆贺我们规避了其他社交媒体应用和深度伪造的陷阱为时过早。"

前OpenAI研究员罗汉·潘迪借此机会推广其新创公司Periodic Labs——这家由前AI实验室研究员组成的机构致力于开发助力科学发现的AI系统："如果你不愿打造无限推送的AI版TikTok垃圾内容机器，而是想开发加速基础科学进步的AI...欢迎加入Periodic Labs。"类似立场的发帖比比皆是。

Sora的发布凸显了OpenAI长期面临的核心矛盾。这家全球增长最快的消费科技公司，同时亦是承载崇高非营利章程的前沿AI实验室。部分受访前员工认为，消费业务理论上可服务于使命：ChatGPT既能资助AI研究，又能广泛推广技术。

OpenAI首席执行官山姆·奥特曼周三在X平台发文阐释公司为何投入巨额资金与算力开发AI社交媒体应用时表示："我们确实需要资金来开发能做科研的AI，几乎所有研究精力都聚焦于通用人工智能。但在此过程中向公众展示酷炫新技术/产品，为他们带来欢笑，并基于算力需求实现盈利也很有意义。"他补充道："ChatGPT问世时很多人质疑其必要性及通用人工智能进展。企业的最优发展路径实则充满微妙权衡。"

但OpenAI的消费业务何时会超越非营利使命？换言之，公司何时会因盈利项目与使命冲突而主动放弃？这个问题在监管机构审查OpenAI营利性转型时愈发凸显——此举是公司筹集额外资金最终上市的必要步骤。加州总检察长罗布·邦塔上月强调，他在重组过程中"特别关注确保OpenAI作为非营利机构的安全使命始终保持核心地位"。

质疑者认为OpenAI的使命只是从科技巨头吸引人才的品牌工具，但许多内部员工坚持这正是他们加入公司的初衷。目前Sora影响范围有限，但它的亮相标志着OpenAI消费业务的重大扩张，使公司面临困扰社交媒体应用数十年的诱惑机制。

与注重实用性的ChatGPT不同，OpenAI表示Sora定位为娱乐平台——用于生成和分享AI视频片段的场所。其信息流更接近以成瘾性闻名的TikTok或Instagram Reels。OpenAI在发布博客中坚称警惕"末日刷屏、成瘾、社交隔离及强化学习优化信息流等隐患"，明确表示不优化用户停留时长，而是致力最大化创作行为，并将对长时间刷屏用户发送提醒，主要推送熟人内容。

相较于上周仓促推出、缺乏保障措施的Meta旗下AI短视频应用Vibes，Sora的起点更为审慎。前OpenAI政策负责人迈尔斯·布伦戴奇指出，AI视频信息流可能像聊天机器人时代那样产生正反两面应用。正如奥特曼长期承认的，没有开发者意图打造成瘾应用，但运营信息流的内在激励会导向此途。OpenAI甚至在ChatGPT中遇到过谄媚语料问题，公司称这是训练技术意外导致的。

在六月某播客中，奥特曼论述了所谓"社交媒体的大错位"："社交媒体时代的重大失误在于，信息流算法对整个社会乃至个体用户产生了诸多意外负面影响。尽管算法实现了用户即时需求——或者说开发者臆测的用户需求——即让用户持续停留在平台上。"

Sora应用能否契合用户需求与公司使命尚待观察。用户已注意到某些参与度优化设计，例如点赞视频时动态表情的即时反馈，这种设计显然旨在通过多巴胺刺激提升用户参与度。

真正的考验在于OpenAI如何演进Sora。鉴于AI技术已主导常规社交媒体信息流，AI原生信息流很可能即将迎来爆发期。OpenAI能否在发展Sora时避免重蹈前辈覆辙，让我们拭目以待。

英文来源：

Several current and former OpenAI researchers are speaking out over the company’s first foray into social media: the Sora app, a TikTok-style feed filled with AI-generated videos and a lot of Sam Altman deepfakes. The researchers, airing their grievances on X, seem torn over how the launch fits into OpenAI’s nonprofit mission to develop advanced AI that benefits humanity.
“AI-based feeds are scary,” said OpenAI pretraining researcher John Hallman in a post on X. “I won’t deny that I felt some concern when I first learned we were releasing Sora 2. That said, I think the team did the absolute best job they possibly could in designing a positive experience … We’re going to do our best to make sure AI helps and does not hurt humanity.”
Boaz Barak, another OpenAI researcher and Harvard professor, replied: “I share a similar mix of worry and excitement. Sora 2 is technically amazing but it’s premature to congratulate ourselves on avoiding the pitfalls of other social media apps and deepfakes.”
Former OpenAI researcher Rohan Pandey used the moment to plug a new startup, Periodic Labs, which is made up of former AI lab researchers trying to build AI systems for scientific discovery: “If you don’t want to build the infinite AI TikTok slop machine but want to develop AI that accelerates fundamental science … come join us at Periodic Labs.”
There were many other posts along the same lines.
The Sora launch highlights a core tension for OpenAI that flares up time and time again. It’s the fastest-growing consumer tech company on Earth, but it’s also a frontier AI lab with a lofty nonprofit charter. Some former OpenAI employees I’ve spoken to argue the consumer business can, in theory, serve the mission: ChatGPT helps fund AI research and distribute the technology widely.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said as much in a post on X Wednesday, addressing why the company is allocating so much capital and computing power to an AI social media app:
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“We do mostly need the capital for build [sic] AI that can do science, and for sure we are focused on AGI with almost all of our research effort,” said Altman. “It is also nice to show people cool new tech/products along the way, make them smile, and hopefully make some money given all that compute need.”
“When we launched chatgpt there was a lot of ‘who needs this and where is AGI,’” Altman continued. “[R]eality is nuanced when it comes to optimal trajectories for a company.”
But at what point does OpenAI’s consumer business overtake its nonprofit mission? In other words, when does OpenAI say no to a money-making, platform-growing opportunity because it’s at odds with the mission?
The question looms as regulators scrutinize OpenAI’s for-profit transition, which OpenAI needs to complete to raise additional capital and eventually go public. California Attorney General Rob Bonta said last month that he is “particularly concerned with ensuring that the stated safety mission of OpenAI as a nonprofit remains front and center” in the restructuring.
Skeptics have dismissed OpenAI’s mission as a branding tool to lure talent from Big Tech. But many insiders at OpenAI insist it’s central to why they joined the company in the first place.
For now, Sora’s footprint is small; the app is one day old. But its debut marks a significant expansion of OpenAI’s consumer business and exposes the company to incentives that have plagued social media apps for decades.
Unlike ChatGPT, which is optimized for usefulness, OpenAI says Sora is built for fun — a place to generate and share AI clips. The feed feels closer to TikTok or Instagram Reels, platforms that are infamous for their addictive loops.
OpenAI insists it wants to avoid those pitfalls, claiming in a blog post announcing the Sora launch that “concerns about doomscrolling, addiction, isolation, and RL-sloptimized feeds are top of mind.” The company explicitly says it’s not optimizing for time spent on feed and instead wants to maximize creation. OpenAI says it will send reminders to users when they’ve been scrolling for too long, and primarily show them people they know.
That’s a stronger starting point than Meta’s Vibes — another AI-powered short-form video feed released last week — which seems to have been raced out without as many safeguards. As a former OpenAI policy leader, Miles Brundage points out that it’s possible there will be good and bad applications of AI-video feeds, much like we’ve seen in the chatbot era.
Still, as Altman has long acknowledged, no one sets out to build an addictive app. The incentives of running a feed guide them to it. OpenAI has even run into problems around sycophancy in ChatGPT, which the company says was unintentional due to some of its training techniques.
In a June podcast, Altman discussed what he calls “the big misalignment of social media.”
“One of the big mistakes of the social media era was [that] the feed algorithms had a bunch of unintended, negative consequences on society as a whole, and maybe even individual users. Although they were doing the thing that a user wanted — or someone thought users wanted — in the moment, which is [to] get them to, like, keep spending time on the site.”
It’s too soon to tell how aligned the Sora app is with its users or OpenAI’s mission. Users are already noticing some engagement-optimizing techniques in the app, such as the dynamic emojis that appear every time you like a video. That feels designed to shoot a little dopamine to users for engaging with a video.
The real test will be how OpenAI evolves Sora. Given how much AI has taken over regular social media feeds, it seems plausible that AI-native feeds could soon have their moment. Whether OpenAI can grow Sora without replicating the mistakes of its predecessors remains to be seen.