Sam Altman is the CEO and co-founder of OpenAI, a generative AI company that launched ChatGPT about two years ago. He has been hailed as the king of generative artificial intelligence, but is he the right person to guide our explorations into AI? In this episode of WIRED’s Uncanny Valley, we take a deep dive into Sam Altman’s background, from his Midwest roots to his early startup days, his time as a venture capitalist, and his rise and fall and rise again at OpenAI.
The blip, as it is referred to internally at OpenAI, was a chaotic three to four days in the company’s history. It started on November 17th, 2023, when Sam Altman received shocking news that he had been fired as CEO. This sent shockwaves through Silicon Valley and the tech industry.
Altman’s journey to becoming the CEO of OpenAI began in the Midwest, where he grew up in a small town in Illinois. He was a bright student and attended Stanford University, where he dropped out after two years to start his first company, Loopt, a location-based social networking app. Loopt was eventually acquired by Green Dot Corporation for $43.4 million.
After the acquisition, Altman became a venture capitalist and joined Y Combinator, a startup accelerator program. He quickly rose through the ranks and became the president of Y Combinator in 2014. During his time at Y Combinator, Altman invested in and mentored many successful startups, including Airbnb, Dropbox, and Reddit.
In 2015, Altman and a group of tech leaders, including Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, founded OpenAI with the goal of developing artificial general intelligence (AGI) in a safe and responsible way. However, the company faced criticism and skepticism from the AI community for its lack of transparency and potential risks associated with AGI.
In 2019, Altman stepped down as CEO of OpenAI and handed the reins to former Google executive, Sam Altman. This move was seen as a way for the company to distance itself from Altman’s controversial views on AI and regain trust from the AI community.
However, Altman’s departure was short-lived, and he returned as CEO in 2020. Under his leadership, OpenAI has continued to make advancements in AI, including the launch of ChatGPT, a language model that can generate human-like text.
But with the power and influence that comes with being at the forefront of AI development, comes great responsibility. As we continue to explore the possibilities and potential risks of AI, it’s important to question whether Sam Altman is the right person to guide us on this journey. Can we trust him to prioritize the safety and ethical implications of AI over profit and power? Only time will tell.
