Inside Sam Altman's Quest to Make AI "Run Like Water"

Inside the Hive

Vanity Fair

News

4.2 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 30 April 2025

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Sam Altman didn’t want to be the subject of a biography, suggesting the AI revolution is about more than one person, says Keach Hagey, a Wall Street Journal reporter and author of “The Optimist.” But on this episode, host and Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Radhika Jones, along with executive editor Claire Howorth and Hive editor Michael Calderone, go deep on the man himself, speaking with Hagey about Altman’s progressive politics, friendship with Peter Thiel, feud with Elon Musk, and dealings with Donald Trump, along with his brief exit from OpenAI—aka “The Blip”—and vision for this potentially world-altering technology.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Claire, Michael, the time has come to draft a headline for today's episode.
0:07.0	Does anybody have a headline for today's episode?
0:10.9	Claire.
0:12.1	Okay.
0:14.6	Simulators, mount up inside Sam Altman's race towards an AI horizon.
0:19.5	That is a Warren G joke for anybody who doesn't get it. My high school reunion's this coming weekend.
0:24.6	Well, all of us watching MTV in the 90s are familiar with Warren G. I'm really stuck because I'm sort of keep vacillating between the optimism and the pessimism
0:37.7	and I'm not sure
0:39.5	where I land right now.
0:41.2	Just mism.
0:42.3	Just mizum.
0:44.3	Riddigo, what about you?
0:45.9	I'm thinking
0:46.6	about something like
0:48.0	Sam's World?
0:51.3	Sam's Club?
0:52.2	Sam's Club, yes.
0:53.6	Thank you. Peter Thiel, Donald Trump. Sam's Club? Sam's Club. Yes. Thank you. That's what I meant.
0:56.2	Sam's Club. And maybe someday Elon Musk.
0:59.0	Sam's Club. Life in a world of open AI. Your future at a discount.
1:09.7	Welcome to Inside the Hive from Vanity Fair, a podcast about power and the people who love it.
1:15.2	I'm Radica Jones, the editor of Vanity Fair, and I'm joined by executive editor Claire Haworth.
	...

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