alt.hn

5/14/2026 at 12:27:29 PM

Sam Altman's Business Dealings Under GOP Scrutiny Ahead of OpenAI's IPO

 https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/sam-altmans-business-dealings-under-gop-scrutiny-ahead-of-openais-ipo-52c1cc4d

by 1vuio0pswjnm7

5/14/2026 at 2:27:07 PM

The thesis is as follows:

OpenAI receives funds as a non-profit.

Some of those funds are redirected to for profit ventures.

Critically, the GM (Altman) of the nonprofit owns shares of the for-profit ventures, that OpenAI funds were redirected into.

A regular company could and does invest in any company even when there's a conflict, as long as the conflict is disclosed and the Board votes in favor of it. There's no criminal element there.

The problem is introduced in Altman's case if

(a) there was no disclosure (red flag) and/or

(b) nonprofit that received the funds, is putting money into things not aligned with the 501(c)(3) mission.

I'm not sure if either (a) or (b) are criminal, but they don't pass the smell test, which is why Altman is being sued in civil court, unrelated to the congressional investigation talked about in the article

by IG_Semmelweiss

5/14/2026 at 3:05:37 PM

The thesis is Altman ran around saying he was building something that will kill everyone, then backed off to saying he’ll just kill everyone’s jobs.

When data centers and a war of choice pushed inflation to 7+% [1], Republicans in the Congress were left scrambling for a scapegoat. And Sam is a terrific scapegoat. He has no public shareholders like the more hated Zuckerberg and Bezos [2]. Yet he has carved for himself a uniquely-visibly throne for a private-company boss. (His only rival for scapegoatiness is Musk. But he’s inoculated from Republicans by his blatant partisanship.)

[1] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm 0.6% MoM in April, 0.9% MoM in March

[2] https://techoversight.org/2025/06/11/tech-ceo-poll-25/

by JumpCrisscross

5/14/2026 at 3:29:58 PM

Also, doesn't musk hate him? I have to imagine he's behind this.

by mywittyname

5/14/2026 at 3:31:35 PM

> have to imagine he's behind this

Is Musk probably throwing fuel on the fire? Yes, probably. (Though we have no proof of this.)

Is Musk causing this? No. This is mainly Altman’s doing. The hyperbole. The lying. The leverage. The pomp. Even Zuckerberg and Bezos haven’t painted a target on themselves like he has. (To the point that I’m borderline sympathetic.)

by JumpCrisscross

5/14/2026 at 3:51:16 PM

Elizabeth Lopatto at The Verge makes a strong case we _do_ have proof that Musk is actively gathering and throwing fuel on the fire: https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/929129/s...

> But the thing is, Molo doesn’t actually have to be good at this job, because the point of this trial isn’t to win — though I’m sure Musk wouldn’t mind a win. The point is to punish Altman, Brockman, and OpenAI. Musk has done that pretty thoroughly — reinforcing in the public’s mind that Altman is a liar and a snake. This morning, I read an exclusive in The Wall Street Journal that assorted Republican AGs and the House Oversight committee wanted to look into Sam Altman’s investments. References to the trial are peppered throughout the article.

by dbreunig

5/14/2026 at 4:21:37 PM

Oh sure, the trial is maybe 5% a Hail Mary and 95% about distracting and disrupting OpenAI. I read "behind this" to mean more-clandestine moves, e.g. planting stories, conducting and leaking oppo, amplifying negative media on X, et cetera.

by JumpCrisscross

5/14/2026 at 5:36:14 PM

It does seem like there is a ton of negative PR and sentiment on social media (including HN) about anything Altman and even Dario do. Like, way more than warranted. It looks more and more like a coordinated campaign, a la https://paulgraham.com/submarine.html

Elon even explicitly threatened the OpenAI guys that they would be "the most hated" people on earth, and given what we've seen him do with Twitter, I strongly suspect there indeed is a submarine with Elon at the periscope.

Altman may be getting the brunt of the AI backlash, but the impact of AI is still extremely preliminary, and it will happen regardless of anything he does. As you mentioned, it doesn't help that these guys are telling the world AI will disrupt all the jobs but... at this point, I think they're just being honest.

As shifty as Altman is, I wonder how he gets more hate than Elon, who has objectively done way more concrete damage to the world.

by keeda

5/14/2026 at 10:06:37 PM

Everyone knows a lot of the scumbag things Elon has done/does so it's not really worth talking about until he does something novel, people are still shedding light on the scumbag things the Sam has done so naturally it's being discussed more frequently as people share what they just learnt.

It would be fair to argue that in a just world Elon would suffer more consequences for being more of a scumbag than Sam but we all know justice doesn't apply to the rich in the US (occasionally this seems untrue but only because other rich people are pissed off at the rich person and they want them tarred and feathered).

by greycol

5/14/2026 at 2:32:25 PM

Doesn't Sam Altman famously not own OpenAI? His whole arrangement is so shady.

by boringg

5/14/2026 at 5:44:02 PM

So a non-profit can absolute invest in or own a for-profit subsidary. This is extremely common. The idea is that the for-profit returns will flow back to the non-profit and remain dedicated to the non-profit mission.

Where things get really shady and run the risk of IRS violations is when the leadership of the non-profit has a seperate for profit stake in the subsidary.

by s1artibartfast

5/14/2026 at 6:23:17 PM

When your public position is that you don't own equity in the company it implies that you aren't making money off of it. However if you have all sorts of side deals through intermediaries and you are making money off the entity it looks quite bad.

by boringg

5/14/2026 at 8:16:48 PM

Perhaps to some that don't know what equity means.

I dont think it looks bad. The devil is always in the details: Were helion and reddit deals fair market value or self dealing?

by s1artibartfast

5/14/2026 at 8:13:42 PM

Sam has stake in Y Combinator from when he was CEO, who also has an ownership stake in OpenAI.

So to say that he owns no part of OpenAI is silly.

by dagamer34

5/14/2026 at 2:40:32 PM

Is there a more benign explanation for these things? Altman is undeniably famously cagey and political but despite most of the tech and non-tech worlds at this point seeing him as some kind of con artist, I still kind of want to try to believe he's not.

No doubt some of OpenAI's founding principles like "stop + assist if a competitor gets to AGI first" are likely flying out the window, perhaps in part due to him and also as one might anticipate of initial lofty ideals and promises, but even with the recent New Yorker and other articles he seems like someone who maybe regularly placates people to avoid personal problems and lies to get out of trouble rather than a Machiavellian tech baron.

by meowface

5/14/2026 at 2:55:45 PM

> he seems like someone who maybe regularly placates people to avoid personal problems and lies to get out of trouble rather than a Machiavellian tech baron.

This would be more plausible were it not for the staggering amount of wealth he’s amassed through those lies.

by mcmcmc

5/14/2026 at 3:02:37 PM

When someone tells you who they are, you should believe them.

by mrhottakes

5/14/2026 at 3:22:45 PM

> ... I still kind of want to try to believe he's not.

Asking genuinely - why?

by jjulius

5/14/2026 at 3:28:51 PM

What if it's actually super-intelligence and a human aligned visionary is at the helm. The good case is very good.

by hx8

5/14/2026 at 7:20:10 PM

If you give me a hundred dollars, I promise I'll come back tomorrow and hand you thirty trillion dollars.

by yifanl

5/14/2026 at 6:44:06 PM

If he's our representative in the era of superintelligence, we are all screwed.

by deaton

5/14/2026 at 5:48:23 PM

I mean what if he's actually the second coming of Christ. We can make up "what if"s all day but it's meaningless to even discuss them if you don't have a shred of evidence to support the claim.

by saulpw

5/14/2026 at 5:57:34 PM

Exactly. The second coming of Christ would be a very good case.

Why people want to believe Altman is good is about the same reason people want to believe in the second coming.

by hx8

5/14/2026 at 6:13:48 PM

I’m really struggling to see how Christian apocalyptic ideas are even remotely relevant.

We used to be capable of so much.

by hluska

5/14/2026 at 7:38:55 PM

So much of the AI Hype is religion encoded. It's relevant because the AI companies are invoking the ideas. If you go around telling people that AI is going to cure cancer, bring about global prosperity, and give you an uploaded immortality then you cannot be surprised when some people start thinking of it similarly to the second coming.

by hx8

5/14/2026 at 10:33:01 PM

I'm consistently amused by the fact that there's still this weird faction of populists on even tech-oriented sites like HN and /r/programming and lobste.rs and Mastodon who have this almost antivax-level stance on AI. I'm not precisely sure what explains it, because many of them actually are smart people and good programmers.

AI very likely will cure many cancers and very possibly (assuming combined with good politicians) will bring about global prosperity. A high percentage of AI company employees and executives and open source developers and researchers sincerely believe it will and so they say they believe it will. They have good reason to believe it, and they will likely be proven correct. If 400 (or 40, or 4) years pass and it's still mostly just creating spreadsheets, I will concede, though.

by meowface

5/14/2026 at 6:58:47 PM

> I mean what if he's actually the second coming of Christ.

Makes sense. Cue Don LaFontaine: In a world, where one man sacrificed himself for all of humanity… And they learned nothing of his lessons… In a country where people lie in his name as an excuse to hate their fellow man… Where they mock him by wearing his moment of death as jewellery¹… He’s back and adopted a new identity to slowly fuck them all and make the world burn… Johnny W Pussyfoot is Jesus in: The Second Coming.

¹ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJSZcxXe7IQ

by latexr

5/14/2026 at 5:15:00 PM

Uhh literally what is one thing Sam has done or said that demonstrates he's either human-aligned or visionary?

by estearum

5/14/2026 at 10:37:31 PM

I could write a giant response to this with dozens of quotes from him and others and various sources but you would just say it's all lies/posturing, so it would not be a good use of my time. I will say that him becoming one of the most prominent funders and promoters of UBI research/experiments 6 years before GPT-3 is probably not a coincidence, though. OpenAI releasing a paper a month ago strongly suggesting the US move towards a more socialist economic system to handle massive economic upheaval is also probably not a coincidence. He obviously founded OpenAI with the primary intent of making AI so that they could make it go well instead of poorly, and it going well means properly addressing mass unemployment, biosecurity risks, some degree of widely distributed access so that the very poorest get meaningful use of the exact same intelligence as what the very richest get to use, etc.

by meowface

5/15/2026 at 2:37:38 AM

This is what the most midwit milquetoast person in the country would try to do if they were in Sam's shoes and, like Sam, once they had a couple billion dollars dangled in front of them they'd abandon all regard for safety or distribution of wealth or whatever-else-they-thought-they-ought-to-care-about.

by estearum

5/14/2026 at 5:06:00 PM

Come on… The guy who said he can’t imagine caring for his child without consulting ChatGPT… The guy who said he didn’t know how to make revenue with ChatGPT, and made a “soft promise” to investors they’d somehow achieve AGI then ask it how to make money… The guy who made a cryptocurrency scam that was banned in multiple countries… The guy who everyone around him says he’s a con artist and a sociopath… That guy? Really?

by latexr

5/14/2026 at 10:38:57 PM

Really. That guy. I'm afraid you're one side of the coin in https://paulgraham.com/fh.html. Paul himself would agree with me on that if he were to read your post.

by meowface

5/14/2026 at 11:20:11 PM

I’ve read enough Paul Graham to know he’s not someone whose opinion I care about or respect. He’s yet another rich guy tech bro out of touch with normal people who unfortunately has an army of wannabe tech and finance bro shills clinging to his every word like he’s some sort of sage. He’s not. He isn’t smarter than anyone else, he just has a bigger platform. I don’t abide by cults of personality, they’re a major reason everything is shit right now. They’re the fuel that perpetuates online and offline toxicity. Bragging that Paul Graham would agree with you is like bragging Will Smith or Kim Kardashian agrees with you: it’s not a badge of honour even if it’s true, and doesn’t make your argument stronger or mean you’re right.

But since you value his opinion so much, perhaps you should inform yourself of what he has said about Altman, including “Sam had been lying to us all the time”.

by latexr

5/14/2026 at 5:49:11 PM

His own sister accused him of sexual assault.

He was fired from his first startup.

He was abruptly fired from ycombinator in shady circumstances.

He was accused by the OpenAI board of lying to them, ousted, and somehow managed to regain control.

He took OpenAI from being a non-profit to a for-profit, with obvious benefits to whoever controls it.

He was massively misleading about the capabilities of his product and predicted AGI within years.

At some point the pattern of all these events should have some weight in your judgement of him, no?

by grey-area

5/14/2026 at 10:24:34 PM

Paul Graham, founder of the website we're on, still says he likes and trusts him. He just was annoyed he was constantly distracted by AI stuff when he was supposed to be running YC as president (which bears no resemblance to any current events...).

He, at worst, finds him to have been (at some point) incompetent, which is very different from finding him immoral. Paul keeps replying to tweets to clarify this when people continue to misportray his stance.

"He was accused by the OpenAI board of lying to them, ousted, and somehow managed to regain control." is the only thing you wrote which is plainly true and valid to state.

I am sure there may exist good, strong criticisms, but your argument is so tendentiously gish-gallopy that it will if anything just make people more likely to disbelieve his critics. (Not that I would do that, since that'd be just as fallacious.)

Why would OpenAI employees all still be happily working for him and publicly supporting him? Why is the company still so successful, and the leader? Why wouldn't most of them have left in droves to Anthropic or elsewhere, by now? Especially given most technical employees at OpenAI (justifiably) share the eschatological views of AI shared' by Anthropic staff and other TESCREALists, in which case they really really try to be careful about who will be responsible for potential future superintelligence. The board and some executives disliked and distrusted him but it's unclear many other people there did or do now. And I'm not just talking about the petition but the people who have continued working there for years afterwards.

by meowface

5/15/2026 at 5:59:06 AM

We’ll see in time if your confident trust in Sam Altman’s good nature is justified.

Personally if someone is found to be untrustworthy by multiple people and does weird stuff (like moving from open non-profit to for profit), I trust them a lot less. I don’t know him so don’t pass judgment but wouldn’t trust him and certainly wouldn’t give his statements credence since he’s been so spectacularly wrong on AI outcomes.

As to people at OpenAI and investors in OpenAI, I certainly wouldn’t expect them to denigrate their CEO just before an IPO, the one who fought off the board and installed his own place men and thus has complete control; it is not in their interests to do so.

If there is a bust after this boom I think quite a lot of bad behaviour and circular deals from The main players (nvidia, OpenAI, MS etc) will be revealed at that point. In a financial boom a lot gets hidden.

by grey-area

5/15/2026 at 8:38:26 AM

[dead]

by dug4wt

5/14/2026 at 3:08:33 PM

He will say whatever it takes to get the result he wants. That's manipulative and, when pursued as a lifestyle, sociopathic.

Living like that is corrupting. When you treat humans like objects, the question of your starting intentions is really secondary.

by elmomle

5/14/2026 at 7:09:48 PM

I like his tactic of talking to everyone individually to be able to tell each person exactly what they want to hear. I now use that one all the time.

by genxy

5/14/2026 at 7:29:18 PM

Beware that there exist people who will cut you out of their lives—professional, personal, whatever—completely, likely with no warning, and possibly loudly, publicly, and with-receipts (if they’ve seen this kind of thing before or have thought through what your next steps will be after they cut you out) if they find out you do this.

All it takes is for a few of them to start comparing notes behind your back. Shit goes sideways extremely fast for people pulling this whose victims start talking to each other without them as the intermediary.

by funimpoded

5/14/2026 at 9:24:56 PM

The secret is to be able to fail up at a rate higher than you burn the ecosystem around you. You are gone before people notice. That and being funny with enough charisma that it doesn't matter. Sam can't actually operate in this environment, everyone already knows his manipulative schticks.

This is one of the reasons that startups prefer the young, they often haven't been exposed to the grift and the manipulation. As a tech bro sociopath, I'd be wary of joining a startup with a mixture of ages, genders, experiences across the spectrum of ICs and management. They probably have experienced too much to be griftable in the same ways as an org stacked with young ICs. You also want to make sure that there are other people in the management chain that are more emotionally unstable. It takes much of the focus off of ones own pathologies.

Happy Hacking!

by genxy

5/14/2026 at 3:25:02 PM

what did he do to you?

by s1artibartfast

5/14/2026 at 3:05:27 PM

We already reached agi a while ago.

by bfivyvysj

5/14/2026 at 7:57:26 PM

Remember when Altman was going around saying he doesn't take a salary, he's just doing the job for the good of humanity? It kind of blew my mind how many people believed him. Even on HN, where much of the community knew something about his pre-OpenAI days, there were plenty of credulous posts defending him as some sort of altruist.

I guess this is why we keep seeing transparent lies and scams from leading tech and business individuals; the lies often work.

by rurp

5/14/2026 at 9:50:10 PM

Not only do lies work, there is also no punishment at all for it.

by Henchman21

5/15/2026 at 12:09:14 AM

quite the opposite

by typeofhuman

5/14/2026 at 6:39:29 PM

The problem with the current political situation/administration in the US is that there's so much existing conflict of interest going on that anytime the government investigates concerns about conflict of interest, it feels politically motivated because of the uneven investigation.

by voncheese

5/14/2026 at 2:41:31 PM

>The problem is introduced in Altman's case if (a) there was no disclosure (red flag)

The article says the investments were disclosed:

"OpenAI board chairman Bret Taylor defended Altman in a court hearing Monday, testifying that Altman had been “forthright” and “proactive and transparent” about his involvements in other companies. Altman recused himself from recent discussions about a deal between OpenAI and Helion as well, The Wall Street Journal reported."

by fauigerzigerk

5/14/2026 at 2:38:32 PM

Even if the board votes in favor, wouldn't it be tax evasion to fund a for-profit corporation using a 503(c)(3) - which is tax deductible for donors?

by randerson

5/14/2026 at 2:51:39 PM

No, non profits can invest in anything. Publicly traded stocks are c-corps too, thats how endowments grow. There is nothing that distinguishes liquid vs illiquid c-corp shares.

Regarding founder ownership, the rules are extremely flexible like a non profit director can’t own more than 20 voting or 35% total of the business venture

but if it happens then it just needs to be remedied within 3 years

so for venture style deals that’s plenty of time to dilute down, and the little known secret in the startup space is that the founders non profit steps in as the lead investor, so all the other investors arent just twiddling their thumbs waiting for a founder to convince someone, it just closes. Other investors dilute founder and non profit, everything is compliant, value is created. Both for profit and non profit side will be tax free, due to QSBS

by yieldcrv

5/14/2026 at 3:26:08 PM

some of the largest for profit investors are non-profits.

It is all about if you can get the money back out.

by s1artibartfast

5/14/2026 at 2:44:06 PM

no, the thesis is: can the fascists control sam altman.

by cyanydeez

5/14/2026 at 2:56:14 PM

That is emphatically NOT the thesis of the linked article. That's the argument made by the politicians being quoted and enumerated. What the article is trying to tell you is that these actions are entirely partisan, and reflect the desires and statements of the largest and wealthiest republican donor, who happens to own a competing interest.

You can think Altman is a bad person and OpenAI is something of a scam and still recognize that using the government as a tool to corruptly hobble your competition is a horrifyingly bad thing.

These are awful times we live in, I really fear what we'll have to be telling our grandkids. Will it be just a cautionary tale about the dangers of populism and partisanship or will it be sad, wistful tales about how much better things were... "before"?

by ajross

5/14/2026 at 1:32:12 PM

I can't help but think that this is due to Musk putting pressure on the current administration to help him win his lawsuit and punish Altman.

by SkipperCat

5/14/2026 at 1:40:02 PM

Personal vendettas between the world's most powerful psychopaths playing out in the stock market while everyone else suffers does seem like the current meta. So it makes sense.

by avaer

5/14/2026 at 3:17:47 PM

I'm all for it, let them attack each other and hopefully the backlash will elect a labor President to turn the final screws on knee capping big tech for the next 50 years.

by shimman

5/14/2026 at 5:18:15 PM

How do you knee cap big tech when other countries continue to push forward with it?

by steve_adams_86

5/14/2026 at 6:46:57 PM

IMHO: when an emerging technology threatens the livelihoods of millions, it's responsible and ethical to step away from seeing this stuff through a purely competitive lens.

Out of the three big geographic players, the US and China are jockeying for "most performant" models (whatever that means) with two separate approaches; the EU is trying to develop models that work best within their privacy, human rights and labour rights frameworks and laws.

All of these have have merits, though arguably the US's (de-facto) strategy of market dominance at any cost with as few restraints as possible will be the worst for society at large. The prudent thing to do would be to first determine if this is something that will actually live up to the hype (which IMO is still very much in the air), and then if it does, turns this into an international collaboration rather than a competitive enterprise.

It's not lost on me that this is a terminally naive point of view.

by _verandaguy

5/14/2026 at 6:15:24 PM

You don't need to cap the technological process. You can simply curb the power of corrupt individuals. If anything it would accelerate progress.

by jayd16

5/14/2026 at 5:43:09 PM

Why did we knee cap CIA/NSA/DOD from nominally operating on Americans when the Soviet Union continued to push forward with it?

For what it's worth, our once-and-(hopefully)-future allies the European Union are already on board with reigning in the surveillance industry (leading by example, even). So your question is more like how can we constrain our domestic technological authoritarians when China continues to embrace theirs. And the answer is that it's not a "how". The "how" is straightforwardly enforcing longstanding concepts like personal information, antitrust bundling, unauthorized access (backdoors in sold products), etc. So your question comes down to more of a why, and the why is because it is in line with our values based around individual liberty.

by mindslight

5/14/2026 at 5:32:34 PM

Democrats being only slightly less beholden to corporate interests and functioning as controlled opposition is exactly how we've gotten to the point we're at. I'd like to be optimistic and say that the backlash from the second Trump catastrophe will be a full 8 years of simmering authoritarianism rather than the current rolling boil, but that wasn't even true after 2020. I think media saturation has gotten so strong that people are just so much easier to lead around by the nose. For example look at how many continuing hardcore Trump supporters there still are, even in the face of appalling abject failures like his choosing to simply give away the Strait of Hormuz of Iran. They've got ever-shifting rationalizations streaming into their brains 24/7.

by mindslight

5/14/2026 at 7:09:19 PM

Yup. that's why we need new Democrats.

by platevoltage

5/14/2026 at 7:51:45 PM

If you want to help these new Democratic candidates, many are primary challengers that could use your help. I work on several Senate and Congressional campaigns, you wouldn't believe how impactful something as a simple well designed static site can be. There is a dearth of tech skills in these campaigns because they simply don't know alternatives.

Lots of low hanging fruit and very few people in the tech world can say they've worked on projects to improve the material lives of everyone by helping elect people that will implement medicare for all, universal childcare, and free school lunches.

by shimman

5/14/2026 at 7:28:05 PM

I agree. But Republicans found a new Republican who spoke to their longstanding frustrations and look what it's gotten us. Just sayin'.

by mindslight

5/14/2026 at 4:58:27 PM

If only there were some way to bet on the outcome...

by ourmandave

5/14/2026 at 2:36:14 PM

God why do people frame things in such extremes? Neither person is a psychopath. If anyone is closer to a psychopath it’s Altman, but he doesn’t completely fit the monicker.

by threethirtytwo

5/14/2026 at 4:19:20 PM

For all his weirdness and moral failings, I don’t see Altman saying things like whites being under apartheid in the US. And worse. Multiple times a day. Every day.

by aerhardt

5/14/2026 at 7:53:42 PM

Outcomes matter, when both people are leading you to undemocratic societies why should I care about their messaging when both result in worse material lives for 100s of millions of people?

by shimman

5/15/2026 at 2:19:57 AM

Psychopaths wear a mask of sanity but underneath they have no moral framework. Some people can hate black people or Muslims or anything like that but these qualities are very human. Things like racism has existed across cultures for more than several millennia among many people. A psychopath is a different ballgame.

A psychopath can plunge a knife into a babies face and feel no emotion. The only reason why the psychopath doesn’t plunge a knife into a babies face is because he has nothing to gain from it. The psychopath appears more sane then a racist because the psychopath is usually better at pretending to be sane simply because he is unable to comprehend the passionate yet racial hatred that the racist feels.

What I am saying is musk does not fit that archetype as much. Altman fits that archetype more. Neither actually crosses the threshold to be called a “psychopath” but if psychopathy was a gradient Altman is further down the line then musk. Much further.

That is the literal definition of what a psychopath is. You’re operating from a lack of understanding of the definition.

by threethirtytwo

5/14/2026 at 8:04:02 PM

Gleefully boasting again and again about ruining tens of thousands of lives is about as clear as it gets for evidence of psychopathy. Along with ~0 instances of empathy.

by rurp

5/14/2026 at 2:58:59 PM

They are absolutely psychopaths. These are people that will flagrantly lie to your face and feel no remorse. They cause mass suffering and feel no remorse. They don't have empathy. They don't have normal human emotions.

by thinkingtoilet

5/14/2026 at 4:24:51 PM

would you prefer sociopath? they're willing to lie to accumulate massive wealth irrespective of the harm.

by danaw

5/14/2026 at 2:49:10 PM

When you're arguing the degree to which such powerful people fit the definition of psychopath, you're at extremes. You've just been in the warming pot too long to see it.

by skeeter2020

5/14/2026 at 2:54:03 PM

[flagged]

by threethirtytwo

5/14/2026 at 3:03:43 PM

Have you asked all the legit clinical psychologists? Or are you just making things up because you're emotional?

by mrhottakes

5/14/2026 at 10:25:28 PM

I have asked several.

by threethirtytwo

5/14/2026 at 3:01:32 PM

So, now we need a clinical diagnosis to call evil people psychopaths or we're unhinged? Do you apply the same high standards to any of the garbage these guys spew or to the impacts of their projects?

by hgoel

5/14/2026 at 3:18:53 PM

The people that have made decisions leading to the direct deaths of millions of people AREN'T evil! There's no clinical definition of evil in the DSM, so they can't be evil you see.

by shimman

5/14/2026 at 10:27:23 PM

Your stupid. They can be evil because it fits the definition. They can’t be psychopaths because it doesn’t fit the definition. Understand?

by threethirtytwo

5/14/2026 at 2:57:30 PM

Haven't you heard? Psychopath, like Pedophile, is a mere epithet these days, to indicate a person's favoured status with the in-crowd. In contrast to the equally meaningless epithet "woke".

by tremon

5/14/2026 at 3:34:24 PM

> like Pedophile

I really wouldn’t conflate these two. People with documented allegations of child rape are in a separate category from diagnosed-over-the-TV types.

by JumpCrisscross

5/14/2026 at 4:21:16 PM

who's calling people pedos that don't at least have credible allegations against them of that crime (eg trump)?

by danaw

5/14/2026 at 6:48:54 PM

Musk has a history.

by lawn

5/14/2026 at 3:44:39 PM

Outside of Elon Musk's Twitter, I think pedophile is actually used pretty appropriately in most spots.

by tombert

5/14/2026 at 7:11:41 PM

Except Psychopath and Pedophile are actual words that weren't lifted straight off of gen-z slang.

by platevoltage

5/14/2026 at 2:11:06 PM

How does everyone else suffer? We’re getting subsidized compute.

by MrBuddyCasino

5/14/2026 at 2:22:27 PM

Look around at the country right now

by mrhottakes

5/14/2026 at 2:30:05 PM

Nothing to do with Altman v Musk. That would be an AI boom that would be going full steam ahead without either of them.

by boringg

5/14/2026 at 2:42:26 PM

Almost no one in the country is feeling a boom. Everyone is feeling the consequences of their greed and recklessness.

by Arainach

5/14/2026 at 5:48:09 PM

AI is the only thing keeping the S&P afloat. You don't want to see what it would look like when all pensions numbers start going down. So far it's fake numbers from inflation and the value is decreasing dramatically, but at least they still go up.

by scottyah

5/14/2026 at 5:53:16 PM

I very much do want to see. A necessary step to fix our problems is for people to stop lying to themselves and thinking things are "going fine".

A plurality of American voters are stubborn and stupid and won't change their ways until they feel direct pain, so bring the pain.

by Arainach

5/14/2026 at 7:12:41 PM

There's no way you think that will be sustainable even in the short term.

by platevoltage

5/14/2026 at 3:19:57 PM

huh? What are you are referring to is the lasting impacts of multiple years of inflation after living without it for 10 years. Those issues predate Musk v. Altman and would be happening without them.

AI build out / boom would be full bore without them.

by boringg

5/14/2026 at 5:01:47 PM

There is no boom. There are massive layoffs, massive inflation, and massive cuts to government services - all caused by the actions of Musk, Altman, and those like them.

by Arainach

5/14/2026 at 6:26:10 PM

Saying there is no AI boom? You are either lying to yourself or not paying attention to whats whappening.

Are there problems? Absolutely - there have been problems at every single second of humanity. We will always be plagued with problems at some times worse than others. That does not mean that there isn't a boom at the same time.

by boringg

5/14/2026 at 7:14:53 PM

There is a boom, but It's a boom for a few thousand people in the country. Everyone else is seeing their energy bills go up, and I can't get a Raspberry Pi for under $100.

by platevoltage

5/14/2026 at 3:12:47 PM

The AI boom started a war with Iran and dismantled American public institutions?

by ambicapter

5/14/2026 at 3:04:15 PM

Musk has a lot to do with the state of the country right now. Do you read the news?

by mrhottakes

5/14/2026 at 3:18:29 PM

You are really giving him a lot of credit here. Thats mostly the news cycle doing what it does - focusing on the big stories and loudest speakers.

by boringg

5/14/2026 at 3:32:43 PM

He ran a government institution that recklessly cut public spending and hurt us all. What are you talking about?

by manphone

5/14/2026 at 5:19:08 PM

DOGE only cut like $7 billion dollars which is nothing in the bigger picture.

by swingboy

5/14/2026 at 6:45:01 PM

Their ineffectiveness at reducing the debt doesn't indicate the changes they made didn't have an outsized effect on many lives. USAID for example.

by kccoder

5/14/2026 at 5:10:43 PM

He was the de facto head of an effort to drastically cut the federal government, and he's donated hundreds of millions of dollars to get Trump and Trump-adjacent people elected. I ask again: do you read the news?

by mrhottakes

5/14/2026 at 5:26:03 PM

These are the kind of hot takes Bluesky needs to hear. And lets be honest you already have an account there.

by MrBuddyCasino

5/14/2026 at 6:14:23 PM

Yeah good job man, stick your head back in the sand. That'll help.

by solid_fuel

5/14/2026 at 6:17:15 PM

Would be nice if we could just afford things instead.

by jayd16

5/14/2026 at 2:25:56 PM

> The moves follow an April article in The Wall Street Journal that detailed Altman’s efforts to have OpenAI back companies he personally invested in.

Sounds a bit like Wework.

by graemep

5/14/2026 at 2:45:20 PM

To be fair, a big part of being in Y Combinator itself is being "heavily encouraged" to use products from other Y Combinators. You just have to do it openly.

by bombcar

5/14/2026 at 3:28:31 PM

Networking and relationship building is fine. its when it goes beyond that, and in particular when there are conflicts of interest, it becomes a problem. Altman seems to have had similar issues when he was at YC: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/04/13/sam-altman-may...

Doing business with companies connected to the CEO often creates a conflict of interest. it could all be OK, of course, but OpenAI investing in companies that Altman has already invested in does not look great and needs to be investigated.

by graemep

5/14/2026 at 2:35:58 PM

Everything about OpenAI sounds like WeWork. Can't wait to see that S1, I'll need a truckload of popcorn.

by baggachipz

5/14/2026 at 7:55:11 PM

Sounds a lot like what Musk does, except maybe that Musk uses his companies to outright bail himself out.

by torlok

5/14/2026 at 2:01:33 PM

So, the protection racket is not working? [1] Maybe some folks need to re-think whether this administration is worth "donating" to?

[1]: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/openai-exec-becomes-top-trump...

by pj_mukh

5/14/2026 at 2:22:34 PM

This story is about congressmen and state attorneys calling for an SEC investigation, not the executive

Which was motivated by a WSJ investigation into Sam’s personal dealings https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/chatgpt-openai-ipo-altman-029ae6...

by dmix

5/14/2026 at 2:29:32 PM

and famously this executive doesn't over-reach to protect "its own"?

by pj_mukh

5/14/2026 at 2:41:54 PM

Your original comment implied that this is a signal that Sam’s influence over the admin hasn’t protected his interests, when that’s still to be seen. The protection racket could still very well benefit him if the SEC ends up taking the case and the admin then tries to interfere with SEC’s independence.

by dmix

5/14/2026 at 8:27:51 PM

Greg Brockman has donated more money to Trump than anyone else. Republicans shouldn't even be bringing OpenAI up let alone let something get to the SEC. Meanwhile low-level thugs get blanket pardons from the administration.

OpenAI and Brockman are getting scammed by this administration and the GOP. I just really hope tech remembers it next time they want to play this "both sides are bad" game come election time.

by pj_mukh

5/14/2026 at 2:40:34 PM

Blackmailers and protection rackets aren't known for being satisfied after a single payment, after they've established someone is willing to pay.

That is why public corruption is such as plague and one of the reasons the US dollar was seen as a safe store of value once.

by throwaway5752

5/14/2026 at 2:04:48 PM

Are you complaining that government is not corrupt enough?

by laurels-marts

5/14/2026 at 2:22:03 PM

That seems like a fairly obvious misreading of the comment.

by mrhottakes

5/14/2026 at 2:12:27 PM

He's saying "hey, maybe stop donating to Republicans expecting them to help you out when in reality they will screw over anyone but themselves and especially don't donate to them when the GOP is aggressively homophobic and wants to get rid of your existence entirely"

by miltonlost

5/14/2026 at 2:35:09 PM

I didn't see anything related to homophobia in the comment or any replies except yours...

by tinfoilhatter

5/14/2026 at 3:55:25 PM

There's a strand of white neoliberal gays (Sam, Thiel) who have thrown their lot in with the far-right for economic benefit.

If any of them read books I would send them a biography of Ernst Röhm

by hdndjsbbs

5/14/2026 at 8:25:06 PM

bingo.

by pj_mukh

5/14/2026 at 1:55:28 PM

Does anyone really believe this is more than performative? Increasingly the most likely outcome of such scrutiny is… nothing. He hasn’t stolen enough from the rich to earn any sort of punishment, and he’s not doing anything too different from the Congress critters that are “investigating” him.

by voakbasda

5/14/2026 at 2:37:07 PM

When his company goes tits-up and connected investors lose billions, he'll suddenly face punishment.

by baggachipz

5/14/2026 at 2:26:20 PM

"hasn’t stolen enough from the rich to earn any sort of punishment". Do you truly believe this is how the world works?

by boringg

5/14/2026 at 2:32:39 PM

Its definitely how America works right now

by bluefirebrand

5/14/2026 at 2:35:50 PM

> Do you truly believe this is how the world works?

It’s a popular meme in Silicon Valley. Hence all the stealing.

by JumpCrisscross

5/14/2026 at 3:34:58 PM

I am sure that nothing illegal was done here.

But the fact that OpenAI was a nonprofit and then suddenly became a for-profit is definitely something that does not feel right. I am 100% sure that it is all legal and such, but we have this mental model that “nonprofits are the good guys, run by people who just want to help humanity and nothing else.”

But that is not true, and probably never was.

by tlogan

5/14/2026 at 5:46:27 PM

could not agree with this take more. it feels like a bait and switch, but not the kind that makes me want to take sharpie to cardboard. it’s just… weird. and i don’t even necessarily think it’s “bad”… it’s just a weird unforced error because openai never “had” to be nonprofit, but they chose that path only to abandon it. just strange. and it makes all their internal docs (especially brockman’s diary, which, as an aside: how the fuck did this shit come up in discovery, and what kind of idiot would say the shit he said in a diary that can come up in discovery like this? i know he is a very smart man, which is what makes it extra hilarious.). but yeah even with how “bad” the various quotes look i’m still mostly on the side of this all being a “nothing-burger”…

by keeganpoppen

5/14/2026 at 6:22:00 PM

> I am sure that nothing illegal was done here.

> I am 100% sure that it is all legal and such

Why are you so confident on either of these statements? Seems like such a weird thing to be confident about when we know so little about the deals that went down

by Petersipoi

5/14/2026 at 3:42:08 PM

The whole idea of a non profit never made any sense, it’s conflating the idea of profitability with altruism. These are completely independent things.

by an0malous

5/14/2026 at 4:29:37 PM

they're not independent; a 501c3 is both a nonprofit and is meant to serve a public good (altruism).

by danaw

5/14/2026 at 3:55:06 PM

Alternative to archive.ph

Text-only, HTTPS optional

No CAPTCHA, no Javascript, no geo-blocking, no DDoS directed at blog

https://assets.msn.com/content/view/v2/Detail/en-in/AA22Xx2j...

Something like

   x=https://assets.msn.com/content/view/v2/Detail/en-in/AA22Xx2j/
   tnftp -4o"|sed 's/.*\"body\":\"/<meta charset=utf-8>/;s/\",\"readTimeMin.*//'" $x > 1.htm
   firefox ./1.htm
or

   links https://assets.msn.com/content/view/v2/Detail/en-in/AA22Xx2j/
   Press "d" then "\"
or

   links -dump https://assets.msn.com/content/view/v2/Detail/en-in/AA22Xx2j/ \
   |sed '1,/\"body\":\"/d;/\"readTimeMin\":/,$d'

by 1vuio0pswjnm7

5/14/2026 at 2:46:27 PM

The Internet is borked.

Verification Required

The visual verification might not be accessible to you. We recommend you to use the audio verification instead. Important: after clicking play, you will hear 6 digits. Please wait until the audio finishes before typing or interacting with the page. No Internet access Why is this verification required? Something about the behaviour of the browser has caught our attention.

There are various possible explanations for this:

    you are browsing and clicking at a speed much faster than expected of a human being
    something is preventing Javascript from working on your computer
    there is a robot on the same network (IP 96.51.144.101) as you
Need help?

ID: 85804002-38eb-95f6-1a32-828ec222a8fb

by skeeter2020

5/14/2026 at 4:14:18 PM

Timing's also worth nothing. the investments piece has been reported on for over a year. It becomes a probe right before liquidity, which makes both sides look opportunistic rather than principled.

by ghostlyy

5/14/2026 at 3:18:12 PM

Ah a shakedown. He will make the required donation and this will go away.

by bluecheese452

5/14/2026 at 1:51:15 PM

Demand his AI chat history be made public!

by ms_anal_tam

5/15/2026 at 12:10:45 AM

I'm certain that's already been reviewed. There's diaries being read at the trial.

by bl4kers

5/14/2026 at 5:51:41 PM

Unfortunately whatever scrutiny Sam Altman comes under can be waved away with Trump's magic wand.

by giwook

5/14/2026 at 4:55:04 PM

They aren't going to do a thing to Altman except extract more bribes.

by kevmo

5/14/2026 at 2:42:23 PM

The notion that this GOP Oversight Committee sincerely cares about corruption is obviously laughable, so I can only assume this is all being done at Elon's behest.

by noelsusman

5/14/2026 at 3:51:36 PM

> Business Dealings Under GOP Scrutiny

Is this even a thing anymore?

by baggachipz

5/14/2026 at 4:39:28 PM

How can anyone take the GOP seriously when they constantly back one of the biggest frauds of the American people who is also a pedophile rapist? Perhaps Sam should embrace that sexual assault allegation from his sister. That seems to be the type of person the GOP supports.

by righthand

5/14/2026 at 12:58:06 PM

This can easily be resolved by a sustantial purchase of Trump family crypto.

by jqpabc123

5/14/2026 at 7:17:31 PM

Or a couple hundred of those phones that definitely exist.

by platevoltage

5/14/2026 at 2:08:44 PM

With worldcoin lol.

by swader999

5/14/2026 at 2:25:08 PM

The Khan demands 10,000 eyeballs as tribute!

by smallmancontrov

5/14/2026 at 4:11:28 PM

GREAT NEWS!!!

by tithos

5/14/2026 at 2:46:41 PM

Altman is a consummate liar and insatiably greedy. The GOP will welcome him in. The downfall will hurt many.

In the words of Hitchens, "Do not imagine that you can escape judgment if you rob people with a false prospectus rather than with a knife."

by metalliqaz

5/14/2026 at 1:21:51 PM

[flagged]

by emmanuelsemugga

5/14/2026 at 6:19:37 PM

[flagged]

by andijati2

5/14/2026 at 2:14:16 PM

Is this why Claude recommended that I use a Trump phone when I use it?

by fred_is_fred