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QuitGPT – OpenAI Execs Are Trump's Biggest Donors

31 points by robin_reala 9mo ago

simianwords 9mo ago
I think this is the direct consequence of the left being anti business. From Sam's previous writings, it doesn't seem like he was or is a huge Trump fan.
- ahoka 9mo ago
  There's practically no "left" in the US.
  - simianwords 9mo ago
    why wouldn't you consider AOC / Bernie the left?
    - WithinReason 9mo ago
      Can you vote for them?
    - jjav 9mo ago
      Two out of 535 easily meets the definition of "practically none". And maybe a few more, so maybe around 1%
  - rapsey 9mo ago
    You are just playing a word game. The democrats are the left in the political arena of the US. If they are not what the left would be in some other country or what someone thinks the left should be is meaningless.
- rapsey 9mo ago
  The left also specifically turned against AI, big tech and data center build out. They would be crazy not to go all in on the republican party just like Elon did.
- EU4EA 9mo ago
  After visiting the page and reading it, it’s clear that Brockman’s $25 million contribution is the statement contribution.
  - simianwords 9mo ago
    Not sure what you mean - Brockman and Sam are practically the same ideologically.
- piva00 9mo ago
  Why use the loaded term anti-business when very, very few on the "left" of the USA are actually anti-business-commies-socialise-everything? From my perspective at most there are attempts to curtail business practices untethered to any morality, which should be a net-positive for society. A completely theoretical pro-business political body would remove any and all obstacles to business: environmental regulations, labour protection, taxation, financial oversight, so on and so forth, I believe we can agree that such move would be detrimental to society at large while making businesses extremely rich, right? The shift of framing that any attempt to curtail the bad downsides/externalities of untethered capitalism is being "anti-business" is either ignorant, misleading, or purely furthering an agenda. There's no way for capitalism to survive without oversight, its incentives are to minmax on a race to the bottom on anything possible that could give a business an edge, without rules around that the benefits of such a system are completely eroded, you create social fractures that are reflected into politics, exactly what's been happening in the USA even before Trump 1. Perhaps this aggressive stance on being pro-business is part of the issue, and pursuing it above all else has steadily shown that society at large doesn't improve even though it fosters consumption, assets inflation, and the key economic metrics used to sell this idea. While this stance is pursued the political power keeps getting accumulated into the hands of an elite detached from reality, uncaring for any social aspect since there's absolutely no moral incentive to think about the social contract when you can live in an ivory tower with the scales tilted to your favour, and among others like you who also don't care about any aspect that can make the life in society better for all. Improvements to society at large are coincidental, not intentional. Capitalism is amoral, we need mechanisms that imbue some morality to it to avoid social fractures, the core issue is finding that line to balance, and which keeps shifting and needs iterative processes to rebalance when needed. The extremist version of pro-business-nothing-else-matters is clearly not the way you find a balance on anything, like any extremism it's almost by definition wrong when meeting reality.
  - rapsey 9mo ago
    > A completely theoretical pro-business political body would remove any and all obstacles to business: environmental regulations, labour protection, taxation, financial oversight, so on and so forth, I believe we can agree that such move would be detrimental to society at large while making businesses extremely rich, right? This assumes that all obstacles and regulations are to the benefit of the environment and people and that the regulation results in intended consequences. In modern western countries regulation is very often ideological and actively harms the populace and economy. Case in point Germany and their green and anti nuclear hysteria, which resulted in total reliance on coal.
msejas 9mo ago
I believe also a big factor that it is way easier to convince Trump that AI is a matter of national security, and to use geopolitical tools (NVIDIA GPU ban on China) to secure their market position as much as possible, and to make it more palatable to the public their corporate bailouts.
throwawaysleep 9mo ago
What I don't understand is why the Democrats don't just come out hard against AI at this point. It is unpopular and the tech titans are openly Republicans.
- rapsey 9mo ago
  The tech titans are openly republicans because the democrats kicked them out.
  - oytis 9mo ago
    Who kicked out whom? I might be missing some context here, to me it were tech bosses who turned to Trump after he won or after it was clear he was about to win.
    - rapsey 9mo ago
      Democrats turned on Elon during covid, as he was against lockdowns. This spread into wide distrust and complete sidelining and antagonism towards tech during the Biden administration. You can hear about it from Ben and Marc on their a16z podcast, when they explained why they are endorsing Trump. This was despite the tech community being predominantly democrats. They turned to Trump, because the democrats shut them out completely and in some cases were highly antagonistic (crypto and elon companies).
      - disgruntledphd2 9mo ago
        > Democrats turned on Elon during covid, as he was against lockdowns. This spread into wide distrust and complete sidelining and antagonism towards tech during the Biden administration. You can hear about it from Ben and Marc on their a16z podcast, when they explained why they are endorsing Trump. Look, a16z basically are talking their book. They went heavily into crypto, and when the Biden administration started taking actions against crypto, they started supporting Republicans. Not everything needs to be complicated.
OutOfHere 9mo ago
This site is an unfair hit-piece because OpenAI had to do what was necessary to survive. A few tens of million isn't that big a deal compared to the billion that the fossil fuel industry donated. By all means, one should not become too dependent on OpenAI, and actually should use open models too. I just don't think that other commercial players are going to be much cleaner.
amai 9mo ago
First Elon Musk, now Greg Brockman. Why do people not understand, that supporting fascism is really bad marketing?

31 points by robin_reala 9mo ago

I think this is the direct consequence of the left being anti business. From Sam's previous writings, it doesn't seem like he was or is a huge Trump fan.

ahoka 9mo ago
There's practically no "left" in the US.
- simianwords 9mo ago
  why wouldn't you consider AOC / Bernie the left?
  - WithinReason 9mo ago
    Can you vote for them?
  - jjav 9mo ago
    Two out of 535 easily meets the definition of "practically none". And maybe a few more, so maybe around 1%
- rapsey 9mo ago
  You are just playing a word game. The democrats are the left in the political arena of the US. If they are not what the left would be in some other country or what someone thinks the left should be is meaningless.
rapsey 9mo ago
The left also specifically turned against AI, big tech and data center build out. They would be crazy not to go all in on the republican party just like Elon did.
EU4EA 9mo ago
After visiting the page and reading it, it’s clear that Brockman’s $25 million contribution is the statement contribution.
- simianwords 9mo ago
  Not sure what you mean - Brockman and Sam are practically the same ideologically.
piva00 9mo ago
Why use the loaded term anti-business when very, very few on the "left" of the USA are actually anti-business-commies-socialise-everything? From my perspective at most there are attempts to curtail business practices untethered to any morality, which should be a net-positive for society. A completely theoretical pro-business political body would remove any and all obstacles to business: environmental regulations, labour protection, taxation, financial oversight, so on and so forth, I believe we can agree that such move would be detrimental to society at large while making businesses extremely rich, right? The shift of framing that any attempt to curtail the bad downsides/externalities of untethered capitalism is being "anti-business" is either ignorant, misleading, or purely furthering an agenda. There's no way for capitalism to survive without oversight, its incentives are to minmax on a race to the bottom on anything possible that could give a business an edge, without rules around that the benefits of such a system are completely eroded, you create social fractures that are reflected into politics, exactly what's been happening in the USA even before Trump 1. Perhaps this aggressive stance on being pro-business is part of the issue, and pursuing it above all else has steadily shown that society at large doesn't improve even though it fosters consumption, assets inflation, and the key economic metrics used to sell this idea. While this stance is pursued the political power keeps getting accumulated into the hands of an elite detached from reality, uncaring for any social aspect since there's absolutely no moral incentive to think about the social contract when you can live in an ivory tower with the scales tilted to your favour, and among others like you who also don't care about any aspect that can make the life in society better for all. Improvements to society at large are coincidental, not intentional. Capitalism is amoral, we need mechanisms that imbue some morality to it to avoid social fractures, the core issue is finding that line to balance, and which keeps shifting and needs iterative processes to rebalance when needed. The extremist version of pro-business-nothing-else-matters is clearly not the way you find a balance on anything, like any extremism it's almost by definition wrong when meeting reality.
- rapsey 9mo ago
  > A completely theoretical pro-business political body would remove any and all obstacles to business: environmental regulations, labour protection, taxation, financial oversight, so on and so forth, I believe we can agree that such move would be detrimental to society at large while making businesses extremely rich, right? This assumes that all obstacles and regulations are to the benefit of the environment and people and that the regulation results in intended consequences. In modern western countries regulation is very often ideological and actively harms the populace and economy. Case in point Germany and their green and anti nuclear hysteria, which resulted in total reliance on coal.

msejas 9mo ago

I believe also a big factor that it is way easier to convince Trump that AI is a matter of national security, and to use geopolitical tools (NVIDIA GPU ban on China) to secure their market position as much as possible, and to make it more palatable to the public their corporate bailouts.

throwawaysleep 9mo ago

What I don't understand is why the Democrats don't just come out hard against AI at this point. It is unpopular and the tech titans are openly Republicans.

rapsey 9mo ago
The tech titans are openly republicans because the democrats kicked them out.
- oytis 9mo ago
  Who kicked out whom? I might be missing some context here, to me it were tech bosses who turned to Trump after he won or after it was clear he was about to win.
  - rapsey 9mo ago
    Democrats turned on Elon during covid, as he was against lockdowns. This spread into wide distrust and complete sidelining and antagonism towards tech during the Biden administration. You can hear about it from Ben and Marc on their a16z podcast, when they explained why they are endorsing Trump. This was despite the tech community being predominantly democrats. They turned to Trump, because the democrats shut them out completely and in some cases were highly antagonistic (crypto and elon companies).
    - disgruntledphd2 9mo ago
      > Democrats turned on Elon during covid, as he was against lockdowns. This spread into wide distrust and complete sidelining and antagonism towards tech during the Biden administration. You can hear about it from Ben and Marc on their a16z podcast, when they explained why they are endorsing Trump. Look, a16z basically are talking their book. They went heavily into crypto, and when the Biden administration started taking actions against crypto, they started supporting Republicans. Not everything needs to be complicated.

OutOfHere 9mo ago

This site is an unfair hit-piece because OpenAI had to do what was necessary to survive. A few tens of million isn't that big a deal compared to the billion that the fossil fuel industry donated. By all means, one should not become too dependent on OpenAI, and actually should use open models too. I just don't think that other commercial players are going to be much cleaner.

amai 9mo ago

First Elon Musk, now Greg Brockman. Why do people not understand, that supporting fascism is really bad marketing?