David 🇬🇱🇪🇺🇺🇦14h ago
evacide
The tl;dr here is that something that most people in Silicon Valley already know: Sam Altman lies a lot. Just constantly. About big and little things. And every effort to hold him accountable has failed. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/04/13/sam-altman-may-control-our-future-can-he-be-trusted
Sam Altman May Control Our Future—Can He Be Trusted?

New interviews and closely guarded documents shed light on the persistent doubts about the head of OpenAI, Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz write.

The New Yorker
Apr 6 at 5:12pmWeb
Show threadeestileib (she/hers)17h ago

@evacide

I have yet to meet a tech big timer who does not lie all the time.

Show threadOrion Ussner kidder17h ago
@eestileib @evacide Considering how much they all worship Steve "Reality Distortion Field" Jobs, that tracks.
Show threadAnton17h ago
@evacide just like his magical parrot.
Coincidence? I think not.
Show threadfuzzyfuzzyfungus17h ago
@evacide I wish there were more attention paid to the fact that the people who talk about 'AI alignment' are...desperately rarely...the sort of people you'd want a bot to be more closely aligned with.
Show threadGabriel N17h ago

@evacide a secret henchman of the PayPal Mafia, always following its _modus operandi_.

#TheDeparted

Show threadPatrick.sh17h ago
@evacide Suchir Balaji tried to hold him accountable and look where he ended up.
Show threadTyrone Slothrop17h ago
@evacide in that case, I wish they would have just titled the piece “Sam Altman is a Lying Liar who Lies All The Time”
Show threadJason Lefkowitz17h ago
@slothrop @evacide They assigned the piece to Ronan Farrow, which is kind of a sub rosa way of making the same point
Show threadTyrone Slothrop16h ago
@jalefkowit @evacide Farrow’s bio piece on the New Yorker site certainly looks impressive
Show threadJason Lefkowitz15h ago

@slothrop @evacide Among other things, he was part of the team that took down Harvey Weinstein. And Weinstein did not spare any expense to try and stop them, either.

I'm a sworn enemy of nepo babies in general, but Farrow has earned his stripes

https://removepaywalls.com/https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/07/us/harvey-weinstein-new-yorker.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/07/us/harvey-weinstein-new-yorker.html

View article without paywall

View article without paywall
Show threadAndreas K15h ago
@slothrop
That's simply not true. I'm sure he sleeps from time to time too.
@evacide
Show thread/\ndy17h ago
@evacide I sense a trend.
Show threadWladimir Palant17h ago
@evacide I like it how nicely this article demonstrates Betteridge's law of headlines.
Show threadStephen Dioxide 17h ago
@WPalant @evacide Beat me to it.
Show threadVon Xylofon15h ago
@WPalant @evacide It was surely written with Betteridge's law of headlines in mind.
Show threadParade du Grotesque 💀17h ago

@evacide

https://archive.is/A26KA

Show threadNeil E. Hodges17h ago
@evacide Just like the president. :/
Show threadAndreas K15h ago
@tk
Yeah, lying seems to a way to be successful in the USA.
@evacide
Show threadNeil E. Hodges15h ago
@yacc143 @evacide Might be a consequence of (and motivation for) the destruction of the US education system that's been going on for decades. >:(
Show threadCeryni16h ago
@evacide Suddenly LLMs hallucinating makes more sense.
Show threadKierkethumbs up convincingly16h ago
@evacide DjAltman
Show threadGabriel N16h ago

@evacide

“When an article’s title is a question, the answer is ‘no’ most of the times.”

Bingo.

Show threadthe elder sea15h ago
@wtrmt Was going to say, if the first sentence of the article isn't just "No." then it's a complete failure.
Show threadGabriel N15h ago

@eldersea there’s an intro after the title, before the article:

“New interviews and closely guarded documents shed light on the persistent doubts about the head of OpenAI.”

I have not seen the documents, but had no doubts about him either.

Show threadKarin Dalziel16h ago
@evacide well that header graphic is sure going to give me nightmares, WTF
Show threadFazal Majid16h ago
@nirak @evacide looks like the ten-headed demon Ravana from the Hindu epic the Ramayana.
Show threadBruce16h ago
@evacide me after reading The New Yorker piece on AI.
Show threadNienkez 🔻16h ago
@evacide @regendans The article loses instant credibility by using an AI generated image.
Show threadD214h ago

@Nienkez @evacide @regendans

Or — and hear me out on this wild idea — mock and scorn that AI image separately from evaluting the 50-70 *pages* of content making the same points you’d make.

Show threadNienkez 🔻13h ago
@cascheranno @evacide @regendans sure, but if you use it, you loose credibiltity in criticising it. Just pay a photographer for a creepy picture of Altman. It is not hard. Instead you say Altman is an untrusthworthy man, but I prefer to use his crap than pay an actual human.
Show threadRealGene ☣️15h ago
@evacide
"One of Altman’s batch mates in the first Y Combinator cohort was Aaron Swartz, a brilliant but troubled coder who died by suicide in 2013 and is now remembered in many tech circles as something of a sage. Not long before his death, Swartz expressed concerns about Altman to several friends. “You need to understand that Sam can never be trusted,” he told one. “He is a sociopath. He would do anything.”"
Show threadMagnus Ahltorp12h ago
@RealGene @evacide Interesting word choice. It's true if by "troubled" they mean "troubled by the government and MIT", but still doesn't really capture the scope.
Show threadBrett15h ago

@evacide

I want to know why Ronan Farrow thinks this is even a question worth asking? Of all the companies teetering on the brink OpenAI is the one that will not make it once the bubble pops.

Show threadJack William Bell15h ago

@evacide

I have a whole rant about this as a more general breakdown in our society. The last line is: "We have a problem with lying assholes and we need to fix it. Our future as a nation depends on this."

Show threadDNA Digital15h ago
@evacide Not in any dimensional way can he be trusted. Not now or ever
Show threadbk15h ago
@evacide
Invoking @ianbetteridge ’s law ( big time )…
Show threadmausmalone15h ago
@evacide I mean, I think that should be well known outside of Silicon Valley just from, like, the stuff he says in public. But it's good of the MSM to actually say it out loud for the totally unconnected normies.
Show threadKlaus Frank15h ago
@evacide tl;dr: no
Show threadminentromaxinfo14h ago
@evacide "Sam Altman May Control Our Future" - How's he going to do that with Meth-amphetamine Clippy and no possible path to making any profit??
Show threadMr. Murphy14h ago
@evacide lord no. lol
Show threadLightfighter14h ago
@evacide Maybe he should run for President
Show threadFredrik Bülow14h ago

@evacide I really recommend this podcast on the topic. At one point Karen Hao tried to figure out if Altman is a boomer or doomer. She asked various people. Everyone who was a doomer thought that Altman was also a doomer and vice versa.

Tech Won't Save Us: We All Suffer from OpenAI’s Pursuit of Scale w/ Karen Hao [Replay]

Episode webpage: https://techwontsave.us/

Media file: https://clrtpod.com/m/pscrb.fm/rss/p/arttrk.com/p/2D5E6/mgln.ai/e/1246/traffic.megaphone.fm/TBIEA2895422424.mp3

Tech Won’t Save Us

Tech Won't Save Us
Show threadOberst Enzian14h ago
@evacide There’s been no efforts to hold him accountable. Rather, people keep throwing money at him because they want in on his big con.
Show threadDan Fixes Coin-Ops13h ago
@evacide his trial got pushed back 'til 2028 and all :(
Show threadGM707713h ago
@evacide His sister is telling the truth.
Show threadbookandswordblog12h ago
@evacide I liked this recent post on "CEO Says a Thing" as a template for journalists https://karlbode.com/ceo-said-a-thing-journalism/
"CEO Said A Thing!" Journalism

"CEO said a thing!" journalism involves parroting the claims of a business leader or executive with absolutely no context, correction, or challenge whatsoever, no matter how elaborate the delusion.

The Fine Print*
Show threadchris overcash11h ago

@evacide @briankrebs I always believed his sister… and lean heavily towards his involvement in Suchir Balaji’s death.

The guy is super fucked up.

Show threadDogiedog6411h ago

@evacide

It's exceptionally easy to lie when you're a soulless sociopath with no morals or standards or ethics or real stances on anything. I wish him the worst.

Show threadPaul Giulan7h ago
@evacide Suchir Balaji