The mainstream media cartel is pumping Sam Altman hard for some reason. Just from today (CNBC):
"Sam Altman wows lawmakers at closed AI dinner: ‘Fantastic…forthcoming’" [1]. When was the last time you saw MSM suck up so hard to a Silicon Valley CEO? I see stories like this all the time now. They always play up the angle of the geeky wizzkid (so innocent!), whereas Sam Altman was always less a technologist and more of a relentless operator and self-promotor. Even Paul Graham subtly called that out, at the time he made him head of YC [2].
True to form, these articles also work hard at planting the idea that Sam Altman created OpenAI, when in fact he joined rather recently, in a business role. Are these articles being planted somehow? I find it very likely. Don't forget that this approach is also straight out of the YC playbook, disclosed in great detail by Paul Graham in previous writings [3].
Finally, in keeping with the conspiratorial tone of this comment, for another example of Sam Altman rubbing shoulders with The Establishment, his participation in things like the Bilderberg group [4] are a matter of public record. Which I join many others in finding creepy, even moreso as he maneuvers to exert influence on policy around the seismic shift that is AI.
To be clear, I have nothing specific against sama. But I dislike underhanded influence campaigns, which this all reeks of. Oh yeah, I will consider downvotes to this comment as proof of the shadow (AI?) government's campaign to promote Sam Altman. Do your worst!
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/16/openai-ceo-woos-lawmakers-ah...
[2] https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/10/sam-altmans-ma... ("Graham said, “I asked Sam in our kitchen, ‘Do you want to take over YC?,’ and he smiled, like, it worked. I had never seen an uncontrolled smile from Sam. It was like when you throw a ball of paper into the wastebasket across the room—that smile.”")
[3] http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Bilderberg_Conference