Sam Altman – Credit Chen Galili
Sam Altman worked so hard when starting his firm OpenAI that he actually contracted scurvy. This was just one of the many interesting things the entrepreneur had to say in an interview with New York Magazine. Sam Altman, who is gay, also told the publication that he wants to start a family with his boyfriend Oliver Mulherin, an Australian programmer.
Mulherin and Sam Altman currently live together in San Francisco.
Altman founded OpenAI with his then-boyfriend Nick Sivo. And Altman revealed in the interview that at the time he worked so hard that he neglected his diet. As a result of not eating enough fruits and vegetables, Altman contracted Scurvy which results from not getting enough vitamin C.
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On his success, Sam Altman spoke modestly saying, “I mean, I am a midwestern Jew from an awkward childhood at best, to say it very politely. And I’m running one of a handful … You know, top few dozen of the most important technology projects. I can’t imagine that this would have happened to me.”
“Failure always sucks, but failure when you’re trying to prove something really, really sucks,” he added.
So, what is the secret of success, according to Sam Altman?
“The most successful founders do not set out to create companies,” he said. “They are on a mission to create something closer to a religion, and at some point it turns out that forming a company is the easiest way to do so.”
On what he sees as the changes soon to come in the world’s economic ecosystem, Altam said, “My work at OpenAI reminds me every day about the magnitude of the socioeconomic change that is coming sooner than most people believe … If public policy doesn’t adapt accordingly, most people will end up worse off than they are today.”
Sam Altman was born in St. Louis Missouri to a Jewish family in 1985. Altman studied computer science at Stanford, but never completed his B.A. When he was only 19-years-old, Altman co-founded Loopta location-based social networking mobile application, and managed to raise $30 million for the new company at such a young age.
Sam Altman joined Y Combinator, an American technology startup accelerator, and became its president just three years later. Then in 2015, he established YC Continuity, a $700 million equity fund investing in YC companies as they matured.
Altman is a vocal advocate for responsible AI development. He has argued that AI has the potential to solve some of the world’s most pressing problems, but that it is important to develop AI in a safe and ethical way.
Sam Altman has been named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time magazine and one of the “Best Young Entrepreneurs in Technology” by Businessweek. He is also the founder of the Long Term Future Fund, a venture capital fund that invests in companies working to solve long-term problems like climate change and pandemics.
