The OpenAI Foundation has announced its first round of grants

By Larks @ 2025-12-04T04:34 (+19)

This is a linkpost to https://openai.com/index/people-first-ai-fund-grantees/

The OpenAI Foundation has announced its first round of grants.

The OpenAI Foundation is announcing the first recipients from the People-First AI Fund, a multi-million dollar investment in community-based nonprofits working to strengthen local communities and expand the opportunity of AI.

Through an open call, the Foundation will provide $40.5 million in unrestricted grants to 208 nonprofits across the United States. Funds will be disbursed by the end of the year. A second wave of $9.5 million in Board-directed grants will be announced in the coming months, supporting organizations already advancing transformative AI work in areas like health that reflect the Fund’s people-first values and potential for broad public benefit. 

The groups in question do not really appear to have been chosen based on any real criteria other than spreading the money around into as many politicians' constituencies as possible. 

Erich_Grunewald 🔸 @ 2025-12-04T06:02 (+8)

That is the most PR-optimized list of donations I have ever seen in my life.

Erich_Grunewald 🔸 @ 2025-12-04T06:30 (+7)

(To be clear, I do think many of these charities do some good and are run with the best of intentions, etc. But I still also stand by the statement in the parent comment.)

NickLaing @ 2025-12-04T06:22 (+5)

Well hopefully when Anthropic does something similar, they will fund Global Health orgs which are likely doing 10-1000x as much good most of that American based list! It blows my mind a little that they are donating zero to LMIC based charities given...

a) Their EA heritage
b) Their support of AI use in Global health - we are currently getting free credits through an accelerator they are sponsoring!
c) Their enthusiasm helping orgs like Penda Health integrate AI diagnosis into their work

DavidNash @ 2025-12-04T09:13 (+5)

I think it makes more sense to consider this part of their marketing budget than their 'trying to do good' budget.

NickLaing @ 2025-12-04T09:14 (+3)

True but that's a sad story and feels a bit manipulative.

LeahC @ 2025-12-04T13:08 (+3)

Several of these organizations were already working with OpenAI partners (Microsoft is the founding partner and anchor tenant of the SOVA Innovation Hub in a town of ~8,000 people) and the call for proposals required applicant organizations to be based in the US. 

I don't know how much of the overlap was deliberate vs. a reflection of who was invited to their nonprofit events and able to respond to the call for proposals on short notice. For some relevant orgs (like those working on AI & health), it may be worth keeping an eye on future funding opportunities and applying. 

Jason @ 2025-12-04T04:44 (+2)

You may want to edit this to include a more descriptive title.

Larks @ 2025-12-04T04:53 (+2)

Thanks, done.

Erich_Grunewald 🔸 @ 2025-12-04T06:00 (+2)

And also to include the link? Or maybe I'm too dumb to see it.

Larks @ 2025-12-04T06:43 (+4)

Thanks, very strange. I definitely selected linkpost; the GUI appears to have forgotten this, possibly when I tried to edit the thumbnail. Fixed.