Zürcher Nachrichten - Sam Altman, ousted pioneer of OpenAI, is serial entrepreneur

EUR -
AED 3.873085
AFN 71.98403
ALL 98.091865
AMD 410.865926
ANG 1.906142
AOA 961.670233
ARS 1051.538092
AUD 1.632295
AWG 1.89276
AZN 1.796773
BAM 1.955638
BBD 2.135523
BDT 126.389518
BGN 1.958718
BHD 0.396967
BIF 3123.440963
BMD 1.054463
BND 1.417882
BOB 7.308394
BRL 6.112667
BSD 1.057612
BTN 88.859931
BWP 14.458801
BYN 3.461213
BYR 20667.465977
BZD 2.131923
CAD 1.486845
CDF 3021.035587
CHF 0.936297
CLF 0.037463
CLP 1028.384713
CNY 7.626405
CNH 7.630566
COP 4744.106555
CRC 538.255361
CUC 1.054463
CUP 27.943258
CVE 110.255856
CZK 25.271148
DJF 188.334381
DKK 7.463529
DOP 63.724715
DZD 140.438353
EGP 51.981689
ERN 15.816938
ETB 128.080678
FJD 2.399904
FKP 0.832305
GBP 0.835681
GEL 2.883997
GGP 0.832305
GHS 16.895599
GIP 0.832305
GMD 74.867216
GNF 9114.244125
GTQ 8.168323
GYD 221.171657
HKD 8.209133
HNL 26.709785
HRK 7.521754
HTG 139.038469
HUF 408.314303
IDR 16764.161957
ILS 3.948029
IMP 0.832305
INR 89.078624
IQD 1385.485097
IRR 44384.968904
ISK 145.147177
JEP 0.832305
JMD 167.96607
JOD 0.747724
JPY 162.746281
KES 136.968641
KGS 91.215016
KHR 4272.645655
KMF 491.985906
KPW 949.015895
KRW 1471.950676
KWD 0.32429
KYD 0.881427
KZT 525.596411
LAK 23240.072622
LBP 94711.445261
LKR 308.984375
LRD 194.603861
LSL 19.241504
LTL 3.113554
LVL 0.637834
LYD 5.165572
MAD 10.544126
MDL 19.217406
MGA 4919.592002
MKD 61.604891
MMK 3424.85323
MNT 3583.063688
MOP 8.480797
MRU 42.220499
MUR 49.781576
MVR 16.291845
MWK 1833.947905
MXN 21.463322
MYR 4.713979
MZN 67.384089
NAD 19.241504
NGN 1756.545202
NIO 38.916773
NOK 11.69185
NPR 142.176209
NZD 1.797139
OMR 0.405466
PAB 1.057612
PEN 4.015067
PGK 4.252647
PHP 61.930171
PKR 293.652946
PLN 4.319842
PYG 8252.315608
QAR 3.85558
RON 4.982551
RSD 116.987298
RUB 105.311966
RWF 1452.579533
SAR 3.960703
SBD 8.847383
SCR 14.594154
SDG 634.2631
SEK 11.576538
SGD 1.416885
SHP 0.832305
SLE 23.83472
SLL 22111.557433
SOS 604.449871
SRD 37.238876
STD 21825.245831
SVC 9.254233
SYP 2649.368641
SZL 19.234405
THB 36.739624
TJS 11.274465
TMT 3.701164
TND 3.336823
TOP 2.469661
TRY 36.323111
TTD 7.181404
TWD 34.245573
TZS 2813.266686
UAH 43.686277
UGX 3881.678079
USD 1.054463
UYU 45.386236
UZS 13537.877258
VES 48.222799
VND 26772.804141
VUV 125.187913
WST 2.943628
XAF 655.902604
XAG 0.034867
XAU 0.000411
XCD 2.849738
XDR 0.796734
XOF 655.902604
XPF 119.331742
YER 263.483869
ZAR 19.17963
ZMK 9491.432086
ZMW 29.037592
ZWL 339.536511
  • RBGPF

    61.8400

    61.84

    +100%

  • NGG

    0.3800

    62.75

    +0.61%

  • CMSC

    0.0200

    24.57

    +0.08%

  • SCS

    -0.0400

    13.23

    -0.3%

  • RIO

    0.5500

    60.98

    +0.9%

  • RELX

    -1.5000

    44.45

    -3.37%

  • RYCEF

    0.0400

    6.82

    +0.59%

  • GSK

    -0.6509

    33.35

    -1.95%

  • AZN

    -1.8100

    63.23

    -2.86%

  • CMSD

    0.0822

    24.44

    +0.34%

  • BTI

    0.9000

    36.39

    +2.47%

  • BCE

    -0.0200

    26.82

    -0.07%

  • VOD

    0.0900

    8.77

    +1.03%

  • BCC

    -0.2600

    140.09

    -0.19%

  • BP

    -0.0700

    28.98

    -0.24%

  • JRI

    0.0235

    13.1

    +0.18%

Sam Altman, ousted pioneer of OpenAI, is serial entrepreneur
Sam Altman, ousted pioneer of OpenAI, is serial entrepreneur / Photo: Drew Angerer - GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP

Sam Altman, ousted pioneer of OpenAI, is serial entrepreneur

Sam Altman, the tech titan behind ChatGPT, was abruptly fired Friday by OpenAI, the company that launched the revolutionary artificial intelligence chatbot.

Text size:

The news of his dismissal caught Silicon Valley by surprise, as the 38-year-old had been hailed as a pioneer and one of the leading figures in the high-stakes world of AI.

Altman, together with Tesla chief Elon Musk and others, started OpenAI in 2015, creating a research company with a stated goal of building generative AI that benefits humanity.

"The technological progress we make in the next 100 years will be far larger than all we've made since we first controlled fire and invented the wheel," Altman said in a 2021 blog post.

- Startup guru -

Born in 1985 into a Jewish family, Altman grew up in a St. Louis suburb, where he got his first computer at the age of eight, according to a long profile in the New Yorker from 2016.

Computers and the access to online community enabled helped him to navigate being gay in a conservative part of the country, Altman said in an interview with Esquire.

Like so many tech figures before him, Altman dropped out of Stanford University to start a company, Loopt, which let smartphone users selectively share their whereabouts.

Loopt was acquired in 2012 in a deal valued at $43.4 million -- and Altman's place in Silicon Valley was secured.

Altman took a year off during which he "read many dozens of textbooks; I learned about the fields that I had been interested in," the San Francisco resident wrote in a post.

He told of learning about nuclear engineering, synthetic biology, investing, and AI.

"The seeds were planted for things that worked in deep ways later," he said.

- T-shirt and shorts -

In 2014, Altman became president of Y Combinator, an "accelerator" that provides startups with guidance and funding in exchange for stakes in the young companies.

Altman expanded Y Combinator's strategy for investing beyond software startups to biotech, energy, and other fields.

"He thinks quickly and talks quickly; intense, but in a good way," said Industrial Microbes founder Derek Greenfield, who met Altman while his biotech startup was getting backing from Y Combinator.

Greenfield recalled Altman always dressing casually, sometimes in a T-shirt and shorts.

"He was very down to earth," Greenfield said.

Altman left Y Combinator, putting his energy into artificial intelligence despite feared risks.

"He's a very deep thinker who is incredibly focused on getting things right," Insider Intelligence senior director of marketing and commerce Jeremy Goldman said.

Altman has proposed that combining artificial intelligence, robotics, and cost-free energy could essentially enable machines to do all the work and provide a "basic income" to adults across society.

"A great future isn't complicated: we need technology to create more wealth, and policy to fairly distribute it," Altman wrote in a blog post.

"Everything necessary will be cheap, and everyone will have enough money to be able to afford it."

- 'Fast cars and survival' -

In the New Yorker article, Altman said he was a "prepper," someone who has preparations and supplies in place to survive an apocalyptic disaster.

He has spoken of owning high-performance sports cars and renting planes to fly around California.

Altman said in a blog post that the last day of each December he writes a list of things he wants to accomplish in the year ahead.

His personal investments include startups working on fusion energy and human life extension.

"I'm super optimistic," he said in a podcast with TED curator Chris Anderson.

"It's always easy to doom scroll and think about how bad things are," Altman added, "but the good things are really good and getting much better."

F.Schneider--NZN