Do you understand the kind of self-absorbed asshole you have to be, to seriously write in your diary, what do I need to do, to have wealth equal to the GDP of the Solomon Islands or the Seychelles? :-)
I wouldn’t want. I have enough. Not everyone is wanting money.
But it is not the point. The point is, when you take high moral ground and talk about bug problems to help humanity, and then your own diary exposes you as avaricious simpleton, the whole high moral ground crumbles. And you expose yourself as another grifter.
That’s what happened to Brockman. Although smart people could see these qualities in altman, brockman etcetera way before that happened
Why can't I want both earning 1B and do good things for the world? Unless his diary directly contradicts what he has said in public (like "I don't care about money"), I see zero moral issues here.
> The point is, when you take high moral ground and talk about bug problems to help humanity, and then your own diary exposes you as avaricious simpleton, the whole high moral ground crumbles. And you expose yourself as another grifter.
Unfortunately, this is now 90% of this space and it is now full of grifters which was not the case in 2010.
In the case of OpenAI, there were less grifters and they were dormant in 2016 and many were exposed in 2023 when Sam was fired and rehired afterwards and most of them infiltrated the company after 2023.
In 10 years time, after this upcoming financial crash, you will hear some of the former-employees after 2023 admitting that they were part of the grift and were never interested in AI in the first place.
"OpenAI was nothing without its people" except only if it meant getting a mansion or a yacht for the benefit of h̶u̶m̶a̶n̶i̶t̶y̶ themselves.
There’s nothing wrong or strange about aspiring to be a billionaire but writing about it in your diary like a hormonal teen girl reading fairy tales is a bad look.
It’s also difficult to take people seriously if they only care about money or, in Altman’s case, power. Single minded obsessiveness about these sorts of things tends to render people intellectually dishonest by definition.
Nonsense. What the hell would you do with 1B? Give it to charities maybe. Maybe set up an investment where dividends are paid to charity. Running out of ideas
Set up a nice investment vehicle with maybe 400m so I can get 1.6m in dividends a year which would be better enough to comfortably travel the world, have a private chef, someone who organized travel so I don't have to..
A nice 12 person yacht on the Mediterranean is 400k eur for 2 weeks (with staff) so I'd realize it's not enough and invest the rest so I could get comfy.
Along the way help friends and family, pay off mortgages, usually good stuff.
What's the point of that? That sounds like the most boring life. You want to rot away on a yacht? Private chef? Are you kidding?
Help family? Sure, although you don't need that much money for that. Friends? Ehh not very smart, just think about the changes in the friendships' authenticity.
Private chef, absolutely. Like some people rot away managing Linux as a desktop or putting together 3D printers instead of buying one that works and using a Mac, I enjoy food.
If anything less than $1B isn't enough then it is never enough. $1B is the new $100M thanks to ongoing currency debasement.
Also, there is something called "taxes" which is what makes anyone who has millions or billions to want even more money and the IRS will still come after you anywhere in the world.
Otherwise they have to renounce their citizenship and move to a tax haven.
You've run out of ideas already? Try harder!
What charities? Why? How much, to which ones? How involved with those charities are you going to be? What dent in history are you going to make with that billion? With or without your name attached. Build housing, cure cancer, feed the hungry, buy this simulator https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/liquidation-of-simulato...
I could be wrong but I think you could get started with all of that with a fraction of $1B.
Sure there is leisure and entertainment but if you want to use it to do something meaningful, with only 24 hours in a day you'll probably have much more money than time to use it well.
On the other hand 1B is really an arbitrary choice of number, so I think the reason he would choose this specific number definitely has more to do with arbitrary reasons (class, status), perhaps subconciously.
Personally I don't agree with the parent that everyone wants that much money. I think I can safely say not only am I content with much less but I also don't ever want to have the responsibility of having to manage that. Though I'm already saying that from a place of privilege where I don't need to worry about survival.
Furthermore, a lot of money almost certainly places you in an outlier group where normal laws and rights as formulated by humans don't apply the same. Assuming everyone has some empathy and sense of justice/righteousness, that should make them intrinsically not want to be in that group.
Completely missing the other costs associated with any of these things. If money was enough to “feed the hungry” Musk or Gates would have already done it. The real problem is systemic injustice, like governments stealing foreign aid that’s meant to go to the poor. Money can’t always solve these.
Time is more valuable than money and unless you have tons of time and space that simulator is just an expensive paperweight.
My point was that there isn't anything I could do with that money, and neither can the vast majority of people in the world. So I would immediately try to pass it on to people who have better use for it
Wishing for 1B is completely nonsensical if you understand what kind of money that is.
I would be a billionaire for about 5 minutes because I'd spend 95% of it making the lives of others better and still have enough left over that neither me nor any of my immediate family ever has to work again instead of hoarding it like the monsters who end up actually having a billion dollars.
What is the point of your comment? It is hard for me to read it in another way than "I am very virtuous", which might be true (well done you!) but usually isn't a thing people post about themselves in a discussion forum...
> There is nothing wrong with wanting 1B. Anybody who said they wouldn't want it is lying.
You said:
> I'd spend 95% of it making the lives of others better
Again, well done you. And... I don't think that's a counter example? Being this virtuous, wouldn't you love to give away a billion? Wouldn't you enjoy it very much? You could write comments about it and people would upvote you!
I do not want a billion dollars, there is no ethical way to get a billion dollars. If I accidentally had a billion dollars I would get rid of the billion dollars as quickly as possible.
The op thinks that I, as well as most of the other responses to them, are liars
> there is no ethical way to get a billion dollars.
I don't buy that at all. One ethical way is to marry someone random who later becomes a billionnaire. Another is to eg create Bitcoin. And I suspect there are ethical ways to create a business that earns a whole lot of money.
What unethical things did Yvon Chouinard do to get his billions? Chuck Feeney? What about Mackenzie Scott (formerly Bezos)? Hansjörg Wyss? Craig Newmark of Craigslist?
Regardless of what else they did, they hoarded enough wealth to live hundreds of lifetime without ever wanting for anything while there are people on this planet who are starving, homeless, or can't afford basic medical care.
Being a billionaire itself is unethical. They are excessively greedy to the point of evil. If they weren't they would have stopped hoarding wealth hundreds of millions of dollars sooner.
If I had enough food to feed a hundred thousand people for the rest of their lives, more than anyone could ever eat in thousands of lifetimes, and I kept hoarding more and more food while people were starving you would ask what the fuck is wrong with me, there's no way I'll ever need all that food. I would rightly be called obsessive, greedy, and a sociopath. Add one layer of abstraction and we hold these monsters up as heroes.
- Yvon Chouinard said he "didn't drive Lexuses". Yes he was a billionnaire, but he lived a simple life, and his net worth was tied in the stock of the company. He has since given most of it away.
- Mackenzie Bezos gave away $26 billion, more than half of her net worth, in the past 6 years. I'm sure she'll continue.
It's not exactly easy to spend so much money _meaningfully_. "Giving it away" sounds simple, but really it's a lot of hard work.
You seem extremely attached to your point of view that all the billionnaires are bad people and that you're a good person. I have a negative visceral reaction to people who loudly proclaim their own moral superiority. I don't think all the billionnaires are that bad, and tbh I have trouble believing you're such good a person. How much have you given to charity?
I haven't said anything about my own morality other than that I don't want a billion dollars.
If you really want to know, I give away more than 10% of my income every year to charity. In just the past decade I've given away about 20% of my net worth, and I'm not even close to set for life. That's more than all but a few billionaires will give away in their lifetimes, and I promise you that I need that 20% much more than any billionaire needs 90% of theirs. If I lose my job I'm fucked, if they never make another dollar they can live thousands of lifetimes without changing their standard of living in any meaningful way.
Does that make me a good person? No.
It absolutely makes them bad people though.
Giving away money doesn't make you a good person, but hoarding it makes you a bad person.
Every billionaire is a policy failure. It's not a question of equity, the issue is that no one human should be that powerful. It's very obvious that its leading to the US's rather quick and colorful decline. A small cohort of very powerful people are moving elections and policy to enrich themselves, everyone else be damned.
Even assuming all of this is true, nothing you've said means it's wrong to want a billion dollars. As described, your issue is with the system that makes it possible to get it.
Do you understand the kind of self-absorbed asshole you have to be, to seriously write in your diary, what do I need to do, to have wealth equal to the GDP of the Solomon Islands or the Seychelles? :-)
No. And I disagree with you. You don't have to be an asshole.
I remember when having 10k was a goal. Then it become having 100k.
It's the same after. Once you have 1M, you'd like 2, 5, 10.
I wouldn’t want. I have enough. Not everyone is wanting money.
But it is not the point. The point is, when you take high moral ground and talk about bug problems to help humanity, and then your own diary exposes you as avaricious simpleton, the whole high moral ground crumbles. And you expose yourself as another grifter.
That’s what happened to Brockman. Although smart people could see these qualities in altman, brockman etcetera way before that happened
Why can't I want both earning 1B and do good things for the world? Unless his diary directly contradicts what he has said in public (like "I don't care about money"), I see zero moral issues here.
Because goal of earning 1B and doing good for the world are goals having very little overlap.
> The point is, when you take high moral ground and talk about bug problems to help humanity, and then your own diary exposes you as avaricious simpleton, the whole high moral ground crumbles. And you expose yourself as another grifter.
Unfortunately, this is now 90% of this space and it is now full of grifters which was not the case in 2010.
In the case of OpenAI, there were less grifters and they were dormant in 2016 and many were exposed in 2023 when Sam was fired and rehired afterwards and most of them infiltrated the company after 2023.
In 10 years time, after this upcoming financial crash, you will hear some of the former-employees after 2023 admitting that they were part of the grift and were never interested in AI in the first place.
"OpenAI was nothing without its people" except only if it meant getting a mansion or a yacht for the benefit of h̶u̶m̶a̶n̶i̶t̶y̶ themselves.
Agree. Just that I see the number much north of 90%. You must be a very optimistic person.
There’s nothing wrong or strange about aspiring to be a billionaire but writing about it in your diary like a hormonal teen girl reading fairy tales is a bad look.
It’s also difficult to take people seriously if they only care about money or, in Altman’s case, power. Single minded obsessiveness about these sorts of things tends to render people intellectually dishonest by definition.
Nonsense. What the hell would you do with 1B? Give it to charities maybe. Maybe set up an investment where dividends are paid to charity. Running out of ideas
Set up a nice investment vehicle with maybe 400m so I can get 1.6m in dividends a year which would be better enough to comfortably travel the world, have a private chef, someone who organized travel so I don't have to..
A nice 12 person yacht on the Mediterranean is 400k eur for 2 weeks (with staff) so I'd realize it's not enough and invest the rest so I could get comfy.
Along the way help friends and family, pay off mortgages, usually good stuff.
It's not that hard to spend 4% a year of that.
What's the point of that? That sounds like the most boring life. You want to rot away on a yacht? Private chef? Are you kidding?
Help family? Sure, although you don't need that much money for that. Friends? Ehh not very smart, just think about the changes in the friendships' authenticity.
Rot away? See the world. It's such a big place.
Private chef, absolutely. Like some people rot away managing Linux as a desktop or putting together 3D printers instead of buying one that works and using a Mac, I enjoy food.
I am not sure the benefit comes from doing it. I find the optionality & the social security attractive
I'd finally feel financially secure
Really?
If anything less than $1B isn't enough then it is never enough. $1B is the new $100M thanks to ongoing currency debasement.
Also, there is something called "taxes" which is what makes anyone who has millions or billions to want even more money and the IRS will still come after you anywhere in the world.
Otherwise they have to renounce their citizenship and move to a tax haven.
I'm not in the US, so I don't care about the IRS.
Tax wise at this level there are very tax efficient vehicles available.
There are a lot of greedy people thinking everyone would die for a bullion. They couldn’t comprehend another way of thinking due to narrow mindset
You've run out of ideas already? Try harder! What charities? Why? How much, to which ones? How involved with those charities are you going to be? What dent in history are you going to make with that billion? With or without your name attached. Build housing, cure cancer, feed the hungry, buy this simulator https://www.1940airterminal.org/news/liquidation-of-simulato...
I could be wrong but I think you could get started with all of that with a fraction of $1B.
Sure there is leisure and entertainment but if you want to use it to do something meaningful, with only 24 hours in a day you'll probably have much more money than time to use it well.
On the other hand 1B is really an arbitrary choice of number, so I think the reason he would choose this specific number definitely has more to do with arbitrary reasons (class, status), perhaps subconciously.
Personally I don't agree with the parent that everyone wants that much money. I think I can safely say not only am I content with much less but I also don't ever want to have the responsibility of having to manage that. Though I'm already saying that from a place of privilege where I don't need to worry about survival.
Furthermore, a lot of money almost certainly places you in an outlier group where normal laws and rights as formulated by humans don't apply the same. Assuming everyone has some empathy and sense of justice/righteousness, that should make them intrinsically not want to be in that group.
Completely missing the other costs associated with any of these things. If money was enough to “feed the hungry” Musk or Gates would have already done it. The real problem is systemic injustice, like governments stealing foreign aid that’s meant to go to the poor. Money can’t always solve these.
Time is more valuable than money and unless you have tons of time and space that simulator is just an expensive paperweight.
Perhaps the commenter would just like to lead a contented life without having to bother with all of that
My point was that there isn't anything I could do with that money, and neither can the vast majority of people in the world. So I would immediately try to pass it on to people who have better use for it
Wishing for 1B is completely nonsensical if you understand what kind of money that is.
Didn’t even buy a Yacht or a Warhol yet.
I would be a billionaire for about 5 minutes because I'd spend 95% of it making the lives of others better and still have enough left over that neither me nor any of my immediate family ever has to work again instead of hoarding it like the monsters who end up actually having a billion dollars.
What is the point of your comment? It is hard for me to read it in another way than "I am very virtuous", which might be true (well done you!) but usually isn't a thing people post about themselves in a discussion forum...
It's a direct response to the person I was replying to, that's how posts work.
The person you were replying to said:
> There is nothing wrong with wanting 1B. Anybody who said they wouldn't want it is lying.
You said:
> I'd spend 95% of it making the lives of others better
Again, well done you. And... I don't think that's a counter example? Being this virtuous, wouldn't you love to give away a billion? Wouldn't you enjoy it very much? You could write comments about it and people would upvote you!
I do not want a billion dollars, there is no ethical way to get a billion dollars. If I accidentally had a billion dollars I would get rid of the billion dollars as quickly as possible.
The op thinks that I, as well as most of the other responses to them, are liars
> there is no ethical way to get a billion dollars.
I don't buy that at all. One ethical way is to marry someone random who later becomes a billionnaire. Another is to eg create Bitcoin. And I suspect there are ethical ways to create a business that earns a whole lot of money.
What unethical things did Yvon Chouinard do to get his billions? Chuck Feeney? What about Mackenzie Scott (formerly Bezos)? Hansjörg Wyss? Craig Newmark of Craigslist?
Regardless of what else they did, they hoarded enough wealth to live hundreds of lifetime without ever wanting for anything while there are people on this planet who are starving, homeless, or can't afford basic medical care.
Being a billionaire itself is unethical. They are excessively greedy to the point of evil. If they weren't they would have stopped hoarding wealth hundreds of millions of dollars sooner.
If I had enough food to feed a hundred thousand people for the rest of their lives, more than anyone could ever eat in thousands of lifetimes, and I kept hoarding more and more food while people were starving you would ask what the fuck is wrong with me, there's no way I'll ever need all that food. I would rightly be called obsessive, greedy, and a sociopath. Add one layer of abstraction and we hold these monsters up as heroes.
- Yvon Chouinard said he "didn't drive Lexuses". Yes he was a billionnaire, but he lived a simple life, and his net worth was tied in the stock of the company. He has since given most of it away.
- Mackenzie Bezos gave away $26 billion, more than half of her net worth, in the past 6 years. I'm sure she'll continue.
It's not exactly easy to spend so much money _meaningfully_. "Giving it away" sounds simple, but really it's a lot of hard work.
You seem extremely attached to your point of view that all the billionnaires are bad people and that you're a good person. I have a negative visceral reaction to people who loudly proclaim their own moral superiority. I don't think all the billionnaires are that bad, and tbh I have trouble believing you're such good a person. How much have you given to charity?
I haven't said anything about my own morality other than that I don't want a billion dollars.
If you really want to know, I give away more than 10% of my income every year to charity. In just the past decade I've given away about 20% of my net worth, and I'm not even close to set for life. That's more than all but a few billionaires will give away in their lifetimes, and I promise you that I need that 20% much more than any billionaire needs 90% of theirs. If I lose my job I'm fucked, if they never make another dollar they can live thousands of lifetimes without changing their standard of living in any meaningful way.
Does that make me a good person? No. It absolutely makes them bad people though.
Giving away money doesn't make you a good person, but hoarding it makes you a bad person.
Every billionaire is a policy failure. It's not a question of equity, the issue is that no one human should be that powerful. It's very obvious that its leading to the US's rather quick and colorful decline. A small cohort of very powerful people are moving elections and policy to enrich themselves, everyone else be damned.
Even assuming all of this is true, nothing you've said means it's wrong to want a billion dollars. As described, your issue is with the system that makes it possible to get it.
That level of personal wealth is inherently immoral and doesn’t *ever* happen without exploitation.
Yapyapyap. Zero proof.