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The weirdest part for me in how this is worded is that Paul G learned about OpenAI’s for-profit arm through an announcement and wasn’t something that Sam sought

The weirdest part for me in how this is worded is that Paul G learned about OpenAI’s for-profit arm through an announcement and wasn’t something that Sam sought his or Jessica’s advice on. For what it’s worth that alines pretty closely with Helen Toner’s narrative that he kept the board in the dark and they (or she) learned about things through announcements.

gitfan86 2y ago
Also strange that PG didn't know that Sam had invested in OpenAI through YC until today.
- blast 2y ago
  I didn't see that in the OP, are you referencing some other information?
  - gitfan86 2y ago
    https://x.com/paulg/status/1796174494026879040 https://x.com/paulg/status/1796174494026879040
    - blast 2y ago
      Oh right, the twitfuckers don't display threads anymore. Thanks.
      - mindslight 2y ago
        If you're using a secure browser, Xitter doesn't even display single tweets any more. Just: > Firefox’s Enhanced Tracking Protection (Strict Mode) is known to cause issues on x.com (lovely inversion of responsibility gaslighting, too)
      - loceng 2y ago
        Can you elaborate on what 'twitfuckers' means in some nuance? If you're signed in you'd see threads, right? Do you think it's bad or unreasonable they try to fight against at least unsophisticated bots and mass scraping attempts?
        varjag 2y ago
        Somehow the bot problem got much worse since Elon took the helm.
        klyrs 2y ago
        He never had a problem with the bots, he was desperately grasping at straws to pull out of the hastily-made ironclad deal that bound him to buy twitter.
        loceng 2y ago
        Whether true or not, thank God that Elon took Twitter as one of the core pillars that the establishment had as part of their censorship-suppression-narrative control apparatus, e.g. the Twitter Files showing the US government engaging in illegal behaviour to censor Americans et al who weren't toeing the acceptable narrative talking points.
        klyrs 2y ago
        I'm not sure what this "god" of yours had to do with it, I'm pretty sure that was the doing of the Delaware Court of Chancery. Musk proves to be a censorious bastard whenever the whim suits him, and your claims about the twitter files is just fake news; lay off it.
        loceng 2y ago
        "Fake news" eh? You obviously haven't watched any of the US senate hearings, nor read any of Matt Taibbi's investigative work - where Elon gave Matt and other journalists access to Twitter's data like email interactions between Twitter employees, the FBI and other government agencies. I won't bother describing the understanding I've come to on God since you don't seem like a deep person to even investigate thoroughly enough, whatever propaganda bubbles you get your news from - makes you thinks it's "fake news" tells me you're lost. Here's Matt's Substack, to make it super easy for you to start reading/learning yourself: https://www.racket.news/ https://www.racket.news/ And here's his specific work on the Twitter Files: https://twitterfiles.substack.com/ https://twitterfiles.substack.com/ Maybe if you start developing your self-awareness, and your self-regulation skills, you'll develop the patience to read more, critically think better - and then that would be a good starting point to contemplate the universe and extrapolate from first principles as to how much of a chance that a God exists. Maybe don't be so confident in your arrogance either; or "lay off it", as you'd say - you're not the super aware person you think you are. 90-minute Bikram hot yoga classes are a good place to start to kick your ass and get your body and mind healthier.
    - jjulius 2y ago
      >And obviously it wasn't influencing me, since I found out about it 5 minutes ago. "Obviously".
- kbenson 2y ago
  Is it? They state they've funded 5000 companies since 2005[1], and if that was evenly spread per year, that's about a company a day. Maybe pg only pays attention to the ones that other people bring to his attention given that amount, and maybe he "knew" about OpenAI in that it was in some report he skimmed or was mentioned but maybe it was seen as entirely handled since it was a project for someone else there. It could entirely have been out of mind within a week or two of him "knowing" it and then it's quickly forgotten, and may seem like new information when it comes up years later. 1: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies https://www.ycombinator.com/companies
  - whoknowsidont 2y ago
    >Is it? Yes.
  - ohashi 2y ago
    Weird that he wouldn't know about a company YC invested in that has an 80B valuation? Yeah... that does seem weird.
    - kbenson 2y ago
      That is weird. Although OpenAI isn't even listed in their startup directory, so maybe the investment was done differently, and not through their normal channels. Or maybe they divested their share after a short period. Whether that means pg would have been more likely or less likely to know about it I have no idea.
  - santoshalper 2y ago
    It's not weird that he didn't know about it the day (or week) that it happened. It IS weird that nobody at YC was talking about OpenAI when it was exploding.
  - josu 2y ago
    I don't think this investment is like the rest, there was a clear conflict of interest in the OpenAI investment given that the CEO of YC was also the founder and one of the directors (?) of OpeanAI. And not only Sam, Jessica Livingston is also one of the founders of OpenAI. This is not a comment on whether PG should have been informed or not, I don't know how YC operates.
encoderer 2y ago
Yes! I think Sam was always Paul and Jessica’s goodest boy and if they found this out by announcement it was likely quite hurtful and explains how rumors spread that he was fired for it.
- slg 2y ago
  > and explains how rumors spread that he was fired for it. And maybe why PG apparently put no effort into dispelling those rumors for months despite being asked to comment on them by places like the Washington Post and there being plenty of discussion about them here and on Twitter. He obviously knew about the rumors and he had plenty of time and opportunity to clarify things previously. But it wasn't until some other external party starts criticizing Altman in the press and we seemingly get an "only I can pick on my little brother" type response. Because that timing is the weirdest thing to me. If PG really cares and respects Altman as much as he always seems to claim, why allow these rumors to persist for so long and suddenly choose this moment to dispute them?
  - choppaface 2y ago
    Perhaps because some things a out how sama did the Apple deal rattled even Microsoft https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openai-ceo-cements-control-as-he-secures-apple-deal https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openai-ceo-cements-c... https://mas.to/@carnage4life/112530015885532391 https://mas.to/@carnage4life/112530015885532391
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > why PG apparently put no effort into dispelling those rumors $100bn is a good motivator!
  - sokoloff 2y ago
    Not commenting on topics is fine (and arguably even the default) response. Don’t allow yourself to feel (or be) obligated to answers questions about a past employee, portfolio company, or similar. If you choose to you can, but the answerer chooses, not the questioner.

gitfan86 2y ago

Also strange that PG didn't know that Sam had invested in OpenAI through YC until today.

blast 2y ago
I didn't see that in the OP, are you referencing some other information?
- gitfan86 2y ago
  https://x.com/paulg/status/1796174494026879040 https://x.com/paulg/status/1796174494026879040
  - blast 2y ago
    Oh right, the twitfuckers don't display threads anymore. Thanks.
    - mindslight 2y ago
      If you're using a secure browser, Xitter doesn't even display single tweets any more. Just: > Firefox’s Enhanced Tracking Protection (Strict Mode) is known to cause issues on x.com (lovely inversion of responsibility gaslighting, too)
    - loceng 2y ago
      Can you elaborate on what 'twitfuckers' means in some nuance? If you're signed in you'd see threads, right? Do you think it's bad or unreasonable they try to fight against at least unsophisticated bots and mass scraping attempts?
      - varjag 2y ago
        Somehow the bot problem got much worse since Elon took the helm.
        klyrs 2y ago
        He never had a problem with the bots, he was desperately grasping at straws to pull out of the hastily-made ironclad deal that bound him to buy twitter.
        loceng 2y ago
        Whether true or not, thank God that Elon took Twitter as one of the core pillars that the establishment had as part of their censorship-suppression-narrative control apparatus, e.g. the Twitter Files showing the US government engaging in illegal behaviour to censor Americans et al who weren't toeing the acceptable narrative talking points.
        klyrs 2y ago
        I'm not sure what this "god" of yours had to do with it, I'm pretty sure that was the doing of the Delaware Court of Chancery. Musk proves to be a censorious bastard whenever the whim suits him, and your claims about the twitter files is just fake news; lay off it.
        loceng 2y ago
        "Fake news" eh? You obviously haven't watched any of the US senate hearings, nor read any of Matt Taibbi's investigative work - where Elon gave Matt and other journalists access to Twitter's data like email interactions between Twitter employees, the FBI and other government agencies. I won't bother describing the understanding I've come to on God since you don't seem like a deep person to even investigate thoroughly enough, whatever propaganda bubbles you get your news from - makes you thinks it's "fake news" tells me you're lost. Here's Matt's Substack, to make it super easy for you to start reading/learning yourself: https://www.racket.news/ https://www.racket.news/ And here's his specific work on the Twitter Files: https://twitterfiles.substack.com/ https://twitterfiles.substack.com/ Maybe if you start developing your self-awareness, and your self-regulation skills, you'll develop the patience to read more, critically think better - and then that would be a good starting point to contemplate the universe and extrapolate from first principles as to how much of a chance that a God exists. Maybe don't be so confident in your arrogance either; or "lay off it", as you'd say - you're not the super aware person you think you are. 90-minute Bikram hot yoga classes are a good place to start to kick your ass and get your body and mind healthier.
  - jjulius 2y ago
    >And obviously it wasn't influencing me, since I found out about it 5 minutes ago. "Obviously".
kbenson 2y ago
Is it? They state they've funded 5000 companies since 2005[1], and if that was evenly spread per year, that's about a company a day. Maybe pg only pays attention to the ones that other people bring to his attention given that amount, and maybe he "knew" about OpenAI in that it was in some report he skimmed or was mentioned but maybe it was seen as entirely handled since it was a project for someone else there. It could entirely have been out of mind within a week or two of him "knowing" it and then it's quickly forgotten, and may seem like new information when it comes up years later. 1: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies https://www.ycombinator.com/companies
- whoknowsidont 2y ago
  >Is it? Yes.
- ohashi 2y ago
  Weird that he wouldn't know about a company YC invested in that has an 80B valuation? Yeah... that does seem weird.
  - kbenson 2y ago
    That is weird. Although OpenAI isn't even listed in their startup directory, so maybe the investment was done differently, and not through their normal channels. Or maybe they divested their share after a short period. Whether that means pg would have been more likely or less likely to know about it I have no idea.
- santoshalper 2y ago
  It's not weird that he didn't know about it the day (or week) that it happened. It IS weird that nobody at YC was talking about OpenAI when it was exploding.
- josu 2y ago
  I don't think this investment is like the rest, there was a clear conflict of interest in the OpenAI investment given that the CEO of YC was also the founder and one of the directors (?) of OpeanAI. And not only Sam, Jessica Livingston is also one of the founders of OpenAI. This is not a comment on whether PG should have been informed or not, I don't know how YC operates.

encoderer 2y ago

Yes! I think Sam was always Paul and Jessica’s goodest boy and if they found this out by announcement it was likely quite hurtful and explains how rumors spread that he was fired for it.

slg 2y ago
> and explains how rumors spread that he was fired for it. And maybe why PG apparently put no effort into dispelling those rumors for months despite being asked to comment on them by places like the Washington Post and there being plenty of discussion about them here and on Twitter. He obviously knew about the rumors and he had plenty of time and opportunity to clarify things previously. But it wasn't until some other external party starts criticizing Altman in the press and we seemingly get an "only I can pick on my little brother" type response. Because that timing is the weirdest thing to me. If PG really cares and respects Altman as much as he always seems to claim, why allow these rumors to persist for so long and suddenly choose this moment to dispute them?
- choppaface 2y ago
  Perhaps because some things a out how sama did the Apple deal rattled even Microsoft https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openai-ceo-cements-control-as-he-secures-apple-deal https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openai-ceo-cements-c... https://mas.to/@carnage4life/112530015885532391 https://mas.to/@carnage4life/112530015885532391
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > why PG apparently put no effort into dispelling those rumors $100bn is a good motivator!
- sokoloff 2y ago
  Not commenting on topics is fine (and arguably even the default) response. Don’t allow yourself to feel (or be) obligated to answers questions about a past employee, portfolio company, or similar. If you choose to you can, but the answerer chooses, not the questioner.