Maps how AI researchers move between labs, startups, and open‑source communities. Learn what incentives matter, why benchmarks drive prestige, and how collaboration networks influence research agendas and breakthroughs.
Academic positions offer research freedom and the opportunity to work on fundamental problems, but often come with resource constraints and longer publication timelines. Career progression follows traditional academic paths with emphasis on publication records and grant funding success.
Large technology companies offer substantial resources and the opportunity to work on problems with immediate practical applications. These environments often provide access to large-scale datasets and computational resources while maintaining some research independence.
Startups offer the opportunity to have significant impact on product development and company direction, often with substantial equity upside. However, they typically involve higher risk and may have limited resources for pure research activities.
Government agencies and policy organizations offer opportunities to work on problems with significant societal impact, though often with different incentive structures and longer decision-making timelines than private sector alternatives.