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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

#431

Post by twoodfin »

greatNespresso wrote: post #270

It came as a surprise for me to learn that PG fired Sam. It's the first time that I read this actually, and if that's true, I find it kind of mysterious that it remained a secret for so long. Or maybe I missed the news somehow but I could not find any other mention of that event on Google.

Weird: The most relevant hn post on Altman’s departure from YC is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19342184

But despite comments to the effect that the YC post indicated Sam’s departure, it doesn’t seem to say anything about it right now?

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

#432

Post by DoreenMichele »

yieldcrv wrote: post #425
DoreenMichele wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have hung out on HN for over 14 years and took a personal interest in "How in the heck did a pretty young woman co-found a company with three men, date one of them and not have this turn into a debacle and scandal in the headlines???" It took quite a few years for the details behind the founding of YC to come out: 1. Jessica Livingston did not co-found a company with three random men. 2. She and Paul Graham were da…

Good observations, a bit of a stretch, regarding scandal and not scandal, real life doesnt follow rigid ideas of “the power dynamics are too extreme for this relationship to exist” that’s just tabloid drama people can be objective mature partners that met on the job where one was an executive and the other doing something menial

That wasn't the "scandal" I had in mind. I was wondering "How in the heck did one of three male co-founders ask her for a date, her say yes and this not turn into three male co-founders fighting over who gets the girl instead of focusing on developing the business?"

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

#433

Post by mrkramer »

bugglebeetle wrote: post #420
imjonse wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He probably has powerful connections beyond SV. He and Greg Brockman have been meeting heads of state and he has been fundraising in the Middle East recently. I wouldn't be surprised if he is sold as representing US interests, hence few dare to criticize him openly.

Yeah, it’s hilarious people think you just get to travel around the world and glad-hand heads of state without “friends” among the three-letter folks. And even more so when you’re doing it in the context of selling a technology with quite obvious intelligence service and military applications.

>And even more so when you’re doing it in the context of selling a technology with quite obvious intelligence service and military applications.

Wasn't Peter Thiel's Palantir meant to be something like military AI for governments to catch threats in the big data. Someone once said that data is the new oil and it's so true, just look at LLMs and OpenAI. That's why Google is held as the world's most powerful data company....not Facebook as a matter of fact.

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

#434

Post by Y_Y »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #419
Arson9416 wrote: post #340

Step 1: Dazzle an influential person Step 2: Persuade them to hitch their reputation to you Step 3: Do whatever you want with minimal repercussions Follow these 3 steps and influential people will actively fight on your behalf, against their own best interests, to avoid embarrassing themselves and diminishing their reputations. Use each influential person as a stepping stone to an even more influential person and rep…

I have hung out on HN for over 14 years and took a personal interest in "How in the heck did a pretty young woman co-found a company with three men, date one of them and not have this turn into a debacle and scandal in the headlines???" It took quite a few years for the details behind the founding of YC to come out: 1. Jessica Livingston did not co-found a company with three random men. 2. She and Paul Graham were da…

While I think it's unlikely that you'll summon pg or dang to comment on something like that it's is an interesting take and I wonder if any of those involved have addressed it elsewhere.

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

#435

Post by ketzo »

imjonse wrote: post #398
QuadrupleA wrote: post #376

From Paul Graham's Twitter, three days ago: "No one in the world is better than Sam at dealing with this kind of situation." Jessica Livingston retweet: "The reason I was a founding donor to OpenAI in 2015 was not because I was interested in AI, but because I believed in Sam. So I hope the board can get its act together and bring Sam and Greg back." Also from a sibling comment: https://twitter.com/search?q=from:paulg…

Paul's tweet is an objective statement, it does not say anything about character or values and is not explicitly supportive.

…you think calling someone “the best in the world” is

a) purely factual

b) not supportive

Uh, what on earth would count as explicitly supportive language?

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

#436

Post by mrkramer »

mock-possum wrote: post #414
mrkramer wrote: post #402

Why would Sam Altman be held as someone irreplaceable....the dude seems like a smart guy but c'mon he is not Jobs or Gates. I remember first time hearing him when he interviewed Zuck about Facebook and entrepreneurship (when he worked for Y Combinator). Now we talk about him as the next Gates or Jobs. I think this was one big marketing stunt from OpenAI, now the whole software and business community talks about them.…

Or is it a big PR stunt for sam ? The unfairly maligned genius ceo whose on company fired him for some bullshit reason and then had to publicly embarrass themselves by begging for him to take them back? That makes him look pretty cool - and I didn’t even know who he was a couple weeks ago.

They wanted it to be something like Apple and Steve Jobs but Jobs was on the another level of computer fanatic.

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

#437

Post by greatNespresso »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #339
greatNespresso wrote: post #270

It came as a surprise for me to learn that PG fired Sam. It's the first time that I read this actually, and if that's true, I find it kind of mysterious that it remained a secret for so long. Or maybe I missed the news somehow but I could not find any other mention of that event on Google.

I've definitely never heard of it, and I was pretty shocked when I read it given how much positive stuff pg has written about sama, and the article itself says the firing "has not been previously reported". Reading some recent pg tweets through this lens, though, I think it makes sense. E.g. there is this tweet: https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1726198939517378988 . Both of the following can be true (and more to the…

You make a fair point about that tweet, it can be ironic or sincere and it left me a mixed feeling. I am not sure what was PG's goal with that tweet but it did not feel necessary.

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

#438

Post by [deleted] »

screye wrote: post #337
mousetree wrote: post #24

> One of those people whose career Altman helped propel was Ilya Sutskever, chief scientist and board member at OpenAI — the person who ultimately fired him. Ilya was plenty successful before OpenAI and would've been just fine without Altman helping to "propel" his career.

HAHA, I know. Ilya, a nobody who wrote the most seminal paper of the last 10 years. The guy that Eric Schmidt and Elon broke their friendship over was just a random nobody. Come on. It is no secret that when OpenAI formed, every single researcher joined so they could work with Ilya (and Zaremba who worked with him, but was less famous). Greg is brilliant but ML people didn't care for him and Sam 'one of those VC guys…

[deleted]

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

#439

Post by machdiamonds »

bmitc wrote: post #387
objektif wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is wrong with Musk again?

He personally does not like the color yellow, so he required it not used in safety contexts just because of that. So he put workers' safety at risk because he may have to see pictures or tour the area once every quarter. There are more stories like this ad nauseum. Or, you could just read his Twitter feed.

You guys just believe whatever you read. Things that can easily be debunked with common sense. For example, there's a lot of yellow in this factory tour he did:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mr9kK0_7x08

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

#440

Post by yieldcrv »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #432
yieldcrv wrote: post #425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good observations, a bit of a stretch, regarding scandal and not scandal, real life doesnt follow rigid ideas of “the power dynamics are too extreme for this relationship to exist” that’s just tabloid drama people can be objective mature partners that met on the job where one was an executive and the other doing something menial

That wasn't the "scandal" I had in mind. I was wondering "How in the heck did one of three male co-founders ask her for a date, her say yes and this not turn into three male co-founders fighting over who gets the girl instead of focusing on developing the business?"

Gotcha, its a timeless tale, Paul Graham is king and finds the eunuch to act as a proverbial chastity belt to while watching over the lady

whether thats what happened or not, it is disarming to say the least and many would be more comfortable with the same situation given the option

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