Ian Goodfellow, the father of GAN, resigned from Apple: "Refused" to return to the office | Flexible office is the best policy

Recently, according to the foreign media Verge's Zoë Schiffer broke the news on social media, Ian Goodfellow, the father of GAN and current director of Apple's machine learning project team, announced his resignation because he did not want to go back to the office. So far, he has worked at Apple for nearly four years.

Ian Goodfellow reportedly revealed the news to employees in an email. He said part of the reason he announced his resignation was due to Apple's plan to restore office work: requiring employees to work at least one day a week in the office until April 11, at least two days a week until May 2, and every week until May 23. Work at least three days a week.

In response, Goodfellow said in an email: "I firmly believe that greater flexibility is the best strategy for my team."

The father of GAN: became an AI celebrity overnight

Ian Goodfellow is the founder of an artificial intelligence method called Generative adj-terminal networks (GAN). The method utilizes two networks, called a generative network and a discriminative network, that can be used to produce unusual and creative outputs in the form of audio, video, and text. His research has been widely cited in the artificial intelligence literature.

The invention of GAN came from one night in 2014, when Ian Goodfellow was drinking and celebrating with a colleague who had just graduated from his Ph.D. I happen to be next to some friends who are working on a tricky project: a computer that can make their own photos, so I ask him for help.

Those researchers are already using neural networks, algorithms that loosely mimic the networks of neurons in the human brain, as "generative" models to create their own believable new data. But the results are often not very good: Computer-generated images of faces are often blurry or have errors, such as missing ears. The plan proposed by Goodfellow's friends is to perform a sophisticated statistical analysis of the elements that make up a photo to help the machine generate the image itself. It required a lot of number crunching, but Goodfellow told them it simply wouldn't work.

As Goodfellow pondered this question over a beer, an idea popped into his head: pit two neural networks against each other. After an overnight coding session, the software he generated worked on the first test.

So Goodfellow called his invention a "generative adversarial network," a technology that caused a huge "shock" in machine learning and made founder Goodfellow an AI celebrity overnight.

Ian Goodfellow: Career highlights from an AI expert

Also in 2014, Ian Goodfellow has been working at OpenAI since earning his Ph.D. from the University of Montreal.

OpenAI is an artificial intelligence research consortium originally funded by Tesla CEO Elon Musk and other tech luminaries. He was paid more than $800,000 at OpenAI, according to a tax filing.

In the years that followed, Ian Goodfellow joined Google as one of Google's senior AI scientists, working primarily on security, including an area known as "adversarial attacks."

In March 2019, Ian Goodfellow left Google and officially announced to join Apple's special projects team and serve as director of machine learning.

Ian Goodfellow joined Apple because Apple was working on using AI to improve its software and hardware. In addition to developing artificial intelligence for features such as FaceID and Siri, Apple has also been developing self-driving technology.

Apple's "return to the office" plan draws dissatisfaction among most employees

Apple employees began returning to Apple Park last month, enacting a three-day office work policy on May 23. Among them, some employees are dissatisfied with the plan to return to the office.

Earlier, a group of employees wrote to Apple CEO Tim Cook, saying, "Without the inclusivity that flexibility brings, many of us feel that we must be at home, happy, and able to do our best. A choice between working, or being part of Apple. It's a decision that none of us take lightly, and a decision many people are reluctant to make."

This time, Ian Goodfellow's departure will make Apple's plan change we can't know, but for the majority of netizens and insiders, everyone's views on the incident are also polarized.

We saw in the comments section of related reports, people who expressed support for working from home said:

"I'm programmer who works from home. I've never been so productive. I've never been so rested."

“Absolutely no reason for anyone to work in the office. Zoom/Teams is perfectly fine, and likely more efficient than being in an office. I mean, you at least save the hour or 2 you waste commuting every day.”

“It has nothing to do with Covid, either. People learned they can do their job effectively from home, and many feel downright insulted to have to come back to the office to work after getting into a comfortable work from home routine.”

......

And those who expressed support for Apple's "return to the office" office plan said:

"Anyway, that said, good riddance to him. There are no irreplaceable people."

“You're not a marriage counselor to work from home. You work at a company that builds products, some are life-changing products, products that require maximum focus, productivity, discipline, quality check, again and again. At-home productivity will never equal at-work productivity. At-home discipline will never equal at-school discipline. Just like you'd never be comfortable with a home-schooled heart surgeon; or get on a rocket built by engineers who worked from home.”

......

At present, we will continue to pay attention to the next progress of this event. So, what do you think about this event? You are also welcome to communicate and interact in the comment area.

Reference link: https://www.macrumors.com/2022/05/07/apple-director-of-machine-learning-resigns/