[barnabee]

I agree with that. Government officials and politicians should have effectively no conflicts of interest because they have no real way to seek valid approval from the electorate for them.

For companies, if you have investors, employees, and (implicitly, because they continue to do business with you) customers all supportive of someone remaining in their position in spite of real or potential conflicts of interest then I think it's reasonable to say those are acceptable — and certainly not unethical — conflicts of interest.

The board deserves and has the right to a say, of course, but the extent to which it can justify a position that goes against those other groups is at best debatable even if they are not wholly comfortable with said conflicts. After all, the board should serve the company (customers, employees, shareholders/investors) and not itself. This [1] timeline of OpenAI board changes also seems to suggest some level of opportunism, and the possibility that at other times, or had departing members been replaced, it may not have been possible to get board consensus for firing Sam, either.

[1] https://loeber.substack.com/p/a-timeline-of-the-openai-board