Sam Altman

AI Visionary

Sam Altman is an American entrepreneur and investor who has been at the forefront of the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution. He is best known as the co-founder and former CEO of OpenAI, a research organization that aims to create and ensure the safe use of human-friendly AI. He is also the former president of Y Combinator, a startup accelerator that has funded and mentored some of the most successful tech companies in the world, such as Airbnb, Dropbox, Stripe, and Reddit.

Early life and education

Altman was born in 1985 in Chicago, Illinois, and grew up in St. Louis, Missouri. He developed an interest in technology and programming at an early age, receiving his first computer at the age of eight. His childhood idol was Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple. He attended John Burroughs School, a prestigious private school in Missouri, where he excelled academically and participated in various extracurricular activities.

In 2005, Altman enrolled at Stanford University, majoring in computer science. However, he dropped out after one year to pursue his entrepreneurial ambitions. He co-founded Loopt, a location-based social networking app, with the seed funding he received from Y Combinator, becoming one of the first participants of the program. He served as the CEO of Loopt until 2012, when it was acquired by Green Dot Corporation for $43.4 million. In 2017, he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Waterloo, recognizing his achievements in the tech industry.

Professional career

After selling Loopt, Altman continued to immerse himself in the startup ecosystem. He co-founded Hydrazine Capital, a venture capital firm, with his brother Jack Altman in 2012. He also joined Y Combinator as a part-time partner in 2011, and became its president in 2014, succeeding its co-founder Paul Graham. He expanded the scope and scale of Y Combinator, increasing the number and diversity of startups funded, launching new initiatives such as YC Research and YC Continuity, and overseeing the growth of its portfolio value to over $65 billion. He also invested in several high-profile tech companies, such as Asana, Airbnb, Pinterest, Stripe, ZenPayroll, and Instacart.

In 2015, Altman co-founded OpenAI, a non-profit research organization dedicated to creating and ensuring the safe and beneficial use of artificial general intelligence (AGI), which is AI that can perform any intellectual task that humans can. He became the CEO of OpenAI in 2019, after it restructured as a hybrid of a non-profit and a for-profit entity, raising $1 billion from investors such as Microsoft, Reid Hoffman, and Peter Thiel. Under his leadership, OpenAI developed and released several groundbreaking AI systems, such as ChatGPT, a language model that can generate coherent and diverse texts on various topics; DALL-E, a vision model that can create images from text descriptions; and Codex, a code model that can write and execute computer programs from natural language commands.

Altman also advocated for the ethical and responsible use of AI, warning of the potential risks and challenges that it poses to humanity and society. He testified before the US Senate in May 2023, calling for the regulation of AI and the mitigation of its existential threat. He also signed a letter in June 2023, along with hundreds of other AI experts, stating that preventing AI from causing human extinction should be a global priority.

Latest news

Altman’s career took a dramatic turn in November 2023, when he was abruptly fired by the board of directors of OpenAI, citing a lack of candor and alignment with the organization’s mission and values. The board, which includes prominent figures such as Elon Musk, Reid Hoffman, and Peter Thiel, reportedly disagreed with Altman’s vision and strategy for OpenAI, especially regarding the balance between AI safety and the push to publicly release new powerful AI tools into the world.

The firing sparked a backlash from many OpenAI employees, who expressed their support for Altman and their dissatisfaction with the board’s decision. More than 500 employees signed a petition demanding the resignation of the board and the reinstatement of Altman as CEO, threatening to quit otherwise. They also accused the board of undermining the transparency and accountability of OpenAI, and of violating its principles and culture.

However, Altman did not remain unemployed for long. On the same day of his firing, he was hired by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who announced that he was creating a new AI subsidiary within Microsoft, and that Altman would lead it along with some of his key people from OpenAI. Nadella said that he was impressed by Altman’s vision and achievements in AI, and that he wanted to leverage his expertise and talent to advance Microsoft’s AI ambitions and capabilities. He also said that Microsoft would continue to support and collaborate with OpenAI, as it has been doing since 2019, when it invested $1 billion in the organization and became its exclusive cloud provider.

Altman said that he was excited to join Microsoft and to work with Nadella, whom he described as a visionary and a friend. He said that he was looking forward to building and deploying AI systems that can empower and benefit humanity, while also ensuring their safety and alignment with human values. He also said that he was grateful for his time at OpenAI, and that he hoped to maintain a positive and productive relationship with the organization and its board.

Altman’s firing and hiring have generated a lot of attention and speculation in the tech industry and beyond, as they reflect the growing importance and influence of AI, as well as the challenges and opportunities that it presents. Altman remains one of the most prominent and influential figures in the AI field, and his future actions and decisions will likely have a significant impact on the direction and development of AI, as well as its implications for humanity and society.

Aeron Nersoya

Abet news | November 21, 2023

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