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

washingtonpost.com

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

#61

Post by elboru »

al_borland wrote: post #44
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…

I find it hard to believe this was the kind of environment he was cultivating at OpenAI if 95% of the staff were ready to follow him out the door. I've worked for the type of people you mention and no one followed them when they leave. 95% threatening to leave in this case is hard to ignore.

Well maybe they were not as good at manipulating as others can be.

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

#62

Post by cma »

patall wrote: post #34

> 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…

> Henry Kissinger?

I think his stock as potential boardmember probably went down with his service on the Theranos board.

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

#63

Post by laaaaea »

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?

This is the confirmation of why people hire him.

Companies, specially start up, are growth garbage. Grow. Grow. Grow.

And CEOs today who get visibility win. Period. e.g. Musk, Sam.

relevant xkcd: https://xkcd.com/125/

Who would you prefer, a sensible, technical, honest CEO driving real efforts or this media circus? There might be a dime a dozen AI startups doing more science based innovation instead of this moore-law-llm. But they don't have the media attention, so their offices are probably empty.

(btw, IMHO i think all of this board non-sense is planned PR, by the company or Sam, which might have gotten out of hand)

PS: The only thing people should be talking from that article is the only fact. That he was hired by YC to vet startups, and instead invested in them from his brother fund. Yet, here we are, talking about everything but it.

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

#64

Post by rsynnott »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #4
CartyBoston wrote: post #2

The bit about PG and Altman parting ways is interesting I wonder if anyone wants to share more :).

Hadn't seen the tweet from Geoffrey Irving before: https://twitter.com/geoffreyirving/status/172675427022402397... > 1. He was always nice to me. > 2. He lied to me on various occasions > 3. He was deceptive, manipulative, and worse to others, including my close friends (again, only nice to me, for reasons)

I don’t see how 1 and 2 are compatible unless you have a really weird definition of ‘nice’.

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

#65

Post by lobsterthief »

rsynnott wrote: post #56
Merrill wrote: post #25

Based on the article and the loyalty shown by openai employees, he appears to be the "difficult to manage" type, rather than the "difficult to work for" type. That's not necessarily a bad thing in employees. I was once told that it is easier to round off the corners of a cube than to develop corners on a sphere.

IME one almost always implies the other.

Not in my experience, at all. Working beneath someone who’s difficult to work for can make your every day at work terrible. Working with someone who’s hard to work with is much more maintainable since you’re more in control of the interactions and can effect change by working with people higher in the org.

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

#66

Post by Jensson »

Merrill wrote: post #25

Based on the article and the loyalty shown by openai employees, he appears to be the "difficult to manage" type, rather than the "difficult to work for" type. That's not necessarily a bad thing in employees. I was once told that it is easier to round off the corners of a cube than to develop corners on a sphere.

From this story sounds more like "difficult to not work for".

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

#67

Post by nerbert »

theGnuMe wrote: post #50
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 is basic bullying. I would ask for specific examples of the performance decline. That will also be a "he said you said" situation. However, sunlight is the best disinfectant. A bully cannot stand in isolation unless he is enabled. But if left too long they can amass too much power as the bully can manipulate enough people to vote for him (see Trump) or manufacture the vote. In those cases it takes a far larger f…

Absolutely. Also reporting these out of the ordinary behaviors before they become problematic is also a way to keep these guys in line. Once they see that you have a systematic way to report (replace report with "ask if this is normal practice within the company"), they’ll avoid you.

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

#68

Post by rsynnott »

patall wrote: post #34

> 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…

Can’t imagine Kissinger is a popular choice for boards today…

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

#69

Post by kordlessagain »

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'm old enough to realize that I have no idea who someone is until I sit with them for a time, and even then I only have a slightly informed way of determining whether they are ethical and can be trusted.

I've always said that in another country, like Germany, it might take time to get to know someone and, if you don't know them, you certainly shouldn't ask how they are doing. In the United States, we say hello and ask how people are, even if they are complete strangers.

This is a generalization, not something to be used for every single person, or culture, but it's a good indication of how cultures deal with trust up front. Here in the US, we'll give you "trust credit" and then roll over you like a semi truck if you screw up later.

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

#70

Post by laaaaea »

intellectronica wrote: post #54

Sensationalist clickbait title. There's nothing in the article that supports the claim that Altman has been "fired". It's almost invariably the case that to most of us, people who are powerful and effective appear "manipulative". In fact, they are manipulative, which is how they achieve so much. It's only a problem if they are manipulative in the service of goals that are unethical or harmful. See also: https://www.r…

> nothing in the article that supports the claim that Altman has been "fired".

it's worse. The article say he invested in companies he was being paid to evaluate for YC, perfect reason to end an exec career. And then was NOT fired.

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