OpenAI

Reasons to avoid

1. OpenAI paid Kenyan workers less than $2/hour to label traumatic content — including graphic violence and sexual abuse — to train ChatGPT, with workers reporting lasting psychological harm.time.com2023-01-18
2. The New York Times sued OpenAI and Microsoft for mass copyright infringement, alleging millions of articles were used to train AI models without permission or compensation.nytimes.com2023-12-27
3. OpenAI converted from a nonprofit to a for-profit company, abandoning its founding mission. Sam Altman stands to receive billions in equity, despite the nonprofit structure's original intent to prevent private enrichment.theguardian.com2025-05-05
4. OpenAI's entire safety team dissolved in 2024, with multiple safety researchers resigning and publicly warning that profit incentives were overriding safety commitments.vox.com2024-05-17
5. OpenAI's data centers consume enormous amounts of water and electricity. A single ChatGPT conversation uses roughly 10x the energy of a Google search, raising serious environmental concerns as usage scales.theguardian.com2023-08-01
6. OpenAI's voice assistant was built to sound like Scarlett Johansson's voice after she had explicitly declined — and the company only paused the voice after she went public with legal action.bbc.com2024-05-22