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Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

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Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#31

Post by Solvency »

bananapub wrote: post #21

it is absolutely fascinating how in all the threads about him, there's all these huge fans, and some people who are apparently highly connected, but no one ever seems to discuss why he has these fancy jobs, why he left others, and why is apparently so well regarded?

It's strangely paradoxical.

Sam has zero charisma. Zero looks. No technical ability. He's not a storyteller. He's not a hype man. He comes off as a mildly surly sloth when he talks.

His actual pre-OpenAI achievements from a product perspective are a joke.

But he was nevertheless "there" for YC and "there" in OpenAI, and a bunch of money was raised, and he's successfully managed to get all spotlights on him at all times, so he's highly visible.

He's like a weird geek following plays from Trumps book: just stay highly visible, associate with any possible win, and be at the center of attention.

Why does it work? Because subconsciously who WOULDNT want to operate this way in life? It takes the least amount of effort compared to many other job tracks or even CEO tracks, and it's become wildly profitable for him.

So the cult of personality idolizing America of today can't help but want their tech Jesus fantasy to work out.

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#32

Post by bloopernova »

lynx23 wrote: post #7

It is hard to see through the unfolding drama. Since I am lacking data (and we all do), I can only fall back to my intuition. When I was listening to Sam being interviewed by Lex, I had to turn the podcast off because I felt I am listening to a deeply flawed and manipulative character. He left a creepy feeling of "Never ever trust this guy".

It's something I have to remind myself frequently: leadership got where they are by surviving the cutthroat backstabbing executive gauntlet. I also have to trust my gut when it sends me warning signals about someone, and I get that a lot from "celebrity" CEOs.

After some reflection, I've found that I sympathize with Ilya Sustkever a bit more now. I'm autistic and I suspect he is neurodiverse in some way. I've definitely been misled by manipulative leaders and peers, been enthusiastic for whatever scheme they had, but regretted it after seeing the aftermath or fallout. I can absolutely see ways Sustkever could have been manipulated by others on the board.

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#34

Post by patall »

> Another person familiar with Altman’s thinking said he was willing to meet with the board’s shortlist of proposed candidates, except for one person whom he declined on ethical grounds.

Now you have me interested, who could that one person be? Charles Koch? Henry Kissinger? Because many of those I would normally have guessed are either in the article as possible collaborator (middle-easter connection) or is already an investor (like Elmo). Honestly, who is too ethically different here and yet still within the anglosphere to be considered a board member?

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#35

Post by temp112123 »

sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote: post #12

Yeah, the craziest thing for me to come out of this was how everyone in HN just assumed he was "innocent". Poor poor sam altman, he's a victim. He comes across as a sleazebag to me.

I don't know about sleazebag, I've mostly been confused as to what exactly he brings to the table. Dude gave himself scurvy after all.

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#36

Post by strangescript »

cma wrote: post #30
fvdessen wrote: post #9

I've had the 'chance' to work with some deeply manipulative persons in the past, the kind who goes to your desk and say 'Hey, I noticed you started to speak to X again, and your performance seems to suffer as a result", where X is a friendly colleague that opposed some plan of that person. It is incredibly difficult to keep those people in check as all that behaviour is off the record and impossible to prove. When pe…

This endorsement of Sam from 2011 is actually pretty damning, though it is so long ago if it were the only thing it wouldn't be a huge red flag: >I just saw Sam Altman speak at YCNYC and I was impressed. I have never actually met him or heard him speak before Monday, but one of his stories really stuck out and went something like this: > "We were trying to get a big client for weeks, and they said no and went with a…

Every good CEO is also a Confidence Man/Woman.

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#37

Post by kybernetyk »

sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote: post #15
breakfastduck wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know people are innocent until proven guilty but it does seem rather bizarre also that he's had literally 0 media scrutiny / never been asked about (to my knowledge) the fact his own sister claims he abused her for years when they were young.

People are innocent until proven guilty in the legal system, where we have is a strict process for assigning a binary guilt outcome. In real life I use all available evidence for scoring outcome likelihoods. I score this guy high on sleazebag, and this article just increased this score.

If you use the "innocent til proven guilty" principle in your day to day interactions you're bound to get fucked by every 2nd person. Well, maybe not that bad but you will still get fucked because you don't have the same resources as a court does to figure out if someone's fucking with you or not.

You just don't have access to tax funded investigators working for months to figure out if the other person tells the truth or not.

So it's down to: Something's off? I'm not trusting you. Especially when you want something from me.

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#38

Post by photochemsyn »

The fight over OpenAI's leadership is more like celebrity gossip than anything else. The most salient takeaway is that closed-source proprietary LLMs are a bad idea and that everyone with any long-term interest in the subject should switch over to the open-source model.

It also has revealed that non-profit philanthropic business models are little more than marketing ploys designed to fool the gullible, and that 'corporate values' statements should be viewed in the same light as the self-serving claims of narcissitc sociopaths are. In particular OpenAI's vague claims about 'ensuring AGI benefits humanity' were so subject to interpretation as to be meaningless (e.g. some may claim that cutting the size of the current human population in half would be a great benefit to humanity, others would argue for doubling it, see the history of eugenics for more of that flavor).

For-profit entities who are upfront about the fact that their only interest is in making money for their investors, executives and stock-holding employees are at least honest about their goals. Of course, this means their activities must be subjected to independent governmental regulation (which is the outcome that the whole 'we have values' BS is intended to avoid).

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#39

Post by sfjailbird »

I really liked the New Yorker portrait 'Sam Altman's Manifest Destiny':

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/10/sam-altmans-ma...

It seemed to really get to the depths of his personality, both the impressive parts, and with some very subtle jabs.

Re: Before OpenAI, Sam Altman was fired from Y Combinator by his mentor

#40

Post by darkerside »

sertbdfgbnfgsd wrote: post #12

Yeah, the craziest thing for me to come out of this was how everyone in HN just assumed he was "innocent". Poor poor sam altman, he's a victim. He comes across as a sleazebag to me.

Victims can be sleazebags, and sleazebags can be poor victims. Both things can be true. Not everyone that is identifying a victimization is feeling or advocating sympathy. It's not black and white.
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