Perhaps one of our most scrutinized tech moguls, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman can’t buy a sportscar, get fired, purchase a house, or make secret plans for an AI-powered superdevice without creating headlines. And yet, in many ways, he remains inscrutable as the face of our AI-fueled hopes and fears.
However, a completely different side of Altman was revealed in The Standard’s “Life in Seven Songs” podcast episode, published Tuesday. In the episode, hosted by Sophie Bearman, Altman reveals some of the lesser-known aspects of his life story and some of the more private quirks of his personality.
Here are five things we learned.
He often stares at a hand ax in his home office
Altman’s home office/work sanctuary is adorned with objects tracking the technological development of humanity’s existence. On one end is a hand ax, the tool used longest by humans and their ancestors. “I just think about how far we have come from this single piece of technology we used everything for,” he said. No comment on whether a Nvidia GPU running ChatGPT is on the other end of the room.
He’s a Blink-182 fan, kinda
Even as he works to create technology that might someday surpass humanity, Altman is very much a millennial. And like nearly every member of his generation who went through an angsty period, he loves pop-punk pioneers Blink-182. But perhaps he’s loath to admit it. Though Altman chose “What’s My Age Again?” as one of the seven songs that symbolize his life, he says it’s not a “good song,” and Blink-182 is “not a good band.” But the memories! Et tu, Sam?
No matter how rich or famous you are, getting fired in public sucks
It was almost a year ago that the OpenAI board ousted Altman from the company in a shocking Friday announcement. As he details to Bearman in the podcast, he turned his home into a de facto command center, with lawyers commandeering his office — the only time he’d ever had guests in the room. The shock and incredibly public nature of the removal “was very painful and sort of shameful,” Altman said. Even though he was back at the company less than a week later, the first few months “were just this crazy fugue,” he recalled. “The whole thing was a just wild, crazy, like, what-the-fuck confusing moment. And then it was over, and we had to pick up the pieces.”
He has taken psychedelics at Burning Man, but he’s not one of those Burners
The utopian ideal of a post-AGI (artificial general intelligence) world might closely resemble Burning Man, according to Altman. That means making art, giving gifts, sharing music, caring for one another, and, crucially, not working. Oh, and there will be drugs. Although he’s partaken during the “five or six” times he’s been to Burning Man, his most transformative experience with psychedelics was a guided “weekend-long retreat in Mexico.”
He’s a pro-natalist and envisions having at least half a dozen kids
The CEO grew up the eldest of four siblings and apparently wants to top that. Having married Oliver Mulherin this year, Altman is more excited to have kids than anything else. How many does he want? Not 20, but “six or eight, maybe, would be awesome.”
You can listen to Altman’s full playlist on Spotify and find a transcript of the podcast episode here. Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at lifeinsevensongs@sfstandard.com.