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Sam Altman worked so hard on building his first startup that he got scurvy

2 points by reqo 3y ago

catchnear4321 3y ago
that cheesy photo at the top is just great. definitely organic. nobody labored over which shot was most humanizing. if it is fluff piece time, sama wants something and fears his image is enough to prevent obtaining it.
alpaca128 3y ago
What a weird way to say "Sam Altman neglected his nutrition", even weirder to brag about it. Many other people worked really hard and didn't get scurvy. It's really not that difficult nowadays.
- catchnear4321 3y ago
  > Many other people worked really hard and didn’t get scurvy. right but those other people aren’t currently looking to sell shares in anything. (and also likely can’t afford these sorts of pieces.) https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-18/openai-is-in-talks-to-sell-shares-at-an-86-billion-valuation https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-18/openai-is...
  - jfengel 3y ago
    Right, but only because Altman got there first. Congratulations to him. But if he'd gone out for lunch on Monday, and somebody else rolled out their product Tuesday, is the world really a worse place? It waited an extra 24 hours, but other than that the only effect is that somebody else got rich instead of him. We celebrate the guys who get rich, but I'm not convinced that they're really being rewarded for the uniqueness of their work, only the uniqueness of their ability to make themselves (and everybody around them) miserable. Which often bodes badly for the future: "I gave myself scurvy so that this company could be first to market, and now I expect all of you to pee in a bottle so that I don't have to hire more people". There's no way to stop people from working themselves and everybody else to death. But we can be skeptical about how crucial they are to technology. Their willingness to harm themselves is not connected to the innovation, which could well have occurred without them. Maybe just a few days later, and a little bit less worrisome.
  - alpaca128 3y ago
    So where are the articles about Bill Gates, Elon Musk etc getting scurvy from their path to become billionaires?
    - catchnear4321 3y ago
      you act like the tabloid that is their lives hasn’t been equally silly

2 points by reqo 3y ago

that cheesy photo at the top is just great. definitely organic. nobody labored over which shot was most humanizing. if it is fluff piece time, sama wants something and fears his image is enough to prevent obtaining it.

alpaca128 3y ago

What a weird way to say "Sam Altman neglected his nutrition", even weirder to brag about it. Many other people worked really hard and didn't get scurvy. It's really not that difficult nowadays.

catchnear4321 3y ago
> Many other people worked really hard and didn’t get scurvy. right but those other people aren’t currently looking to sell shares in anything. (and also likely can’t afford these sorts of pieces.) https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-18/openai-is-in-talks-to-sell-shares-at-an-86-billion-valuation https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-18/openai-is...
- jfengel 3y ago
  Right, but only because Altman got there first. Congratulations to him. But if he'd gone out for lunch on Monday, and somebody else rolled out their product Tuesday, is the world really a worse place? It waited an extra 24 hours, but other than that the only effect is that somebody else got rich instead of him. We celebrate the guys who get rich, but I'm not convinced that they're really being rewarded for the uniqueness of their work, only the uniqueness of their ability to make themselves (and everybody around them) miserable. Which often bodes badly for the future: "I gave myself scurvy so that this company could be first to market, and now I expect all of you to pee in a bottle so that I don't have to hire more people". There's no way to stop people from working themselves and everybody else to death. But we can be skeptical about how crucial they are to technology. Their willingness to harm themselves is not connected to the innovation, which could well have occurred without them. Maybe just a few days later, and a little bit less worrisome.
- alpaca128 3y ago
  So where are the articles about Bill Gates, Elon Musk etc getting scurvy from their path to become billionaires?
  - catchnear4321 3y ago
    you act like the tabloid that is their lives hasn’t been equally silly