Ronan Farrow on Sam Altman's strained relationship with the truth — Decoder

[0:00] There's a line in the story that to me feels like the thesis of the story. [0:03] Sam Allman is unconstrained by the truth in that he has two traits that are almost never seen in [0:08] the same person. The first is a strong desire to please people, to be liked in any given interaction, [0:13] and the second is an almost sociopathic lack of concern for the consequences that may come [0:18] from deceiving someone. So many other people around it who had the concerns and voiced them [0:24] urgently just folded like napkins and changed their tune the moment they saw the wind was blowing [0:30] the other way and they wanted in on the profit train. It's pretty dark, honestly, from my standpoint [0:36] as a reporter. But then I think back to Sam getting fired. I took a source call at the Bronx Zoo at 7 [0:42] p.m. on a Friday and it was someone saying they're going to try to get Sam back. Well, first of all, [0:47] sorry to your daughter and my partner and all the other people around journalists. [0:51] It was quite a weekend for everyone. Yeah, no, it does take over one's life. [0:56] Hello and welcome to Decoder. I'm Nilay Patel, editor-in-chief of The Verge, [1:01] and Decoder is my show about big ideas and other problems. Today, I'm talking with Ronan Farrow, [1:06] one of the biggest stars of investigative reporting working today. Ronan broke the Harvey Weinstein [1:11] story, among many, many others. And just last week, he and co-author Andrew Marantz published an [1:16] incredible deep dive feature in The New Yorker about OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, his trustworthiness, [1:22] and the rise of OpenAI itself. One note before we go any further here. The New Yorker published [1:27] that story and Ronan and I had this conversation before the attacks on Sam Altman's home. So you [1:33] won't hear us talk about them directly. But just to say it, I think violence of any kind is unacceptable. [1:39] These attacks on Sam were unacceptable. And that the kind of helplessness that people feel [1:44] which leads to this kind of violence is also unacceptable. And it's worth more scrutiny [1:50] from both the industry and our political leaders. I hope that's clear. All that said, [1:54] there is a lot of swirl around Sam Altman that's fair game for rigorous reporting. [1:59] The kind of reporting that Ronan set out to do. Thanks to the popularity of ChatGBT, [2:03] Altman has emerged as the most visible figurehead of the AI industry, having turned a once non-profit [2:09] research lab into an almost trillion-dollar private company in just a few years. [2:14] But the myth of Sam Altman is deeply conflicted, defined equally by both his obvious dealmaking [2:19] ability and the tendency, which Ronan reported, to, well, lie to everyone around him. Ronan talked to [2:25] Altman many times over the 18 months he spent reporting the story. And so one of the main things [2:30] I was curious about was whether Ronan sensed any change in Altman over that time. After all, [2:35] a lot has happened in AI, in tech, and in the world over the past year and a half. You'll hear [2:40] Ronan talk about that very directly, as well as a sense that people have become much more willing [2:45] to talk about Altman's ability to stretch the truth. Okay, Ronan Farrow on Sam Altman, AI, [2:50] and the truth. Here we go. Ronan Farrow, you're an investigative reporter and contributor to The New [2:54] Yorker. Welcome to Decoder. Glad to be here. Thanks for having me. I am very excited to talk to you. You [2:58] just wrote a big piece for The New Yorker. It's a profile of Sam Altman and sort of with it, [3:03] open AI. My read of it is, as all great features do, it, with rigorous reporting, [3:10] validates a lot of feelings people have had about Sam Altman for a very long time. [3:15] You've obviously published it. You've gotten reactions to it. How are you feeling about it [3:18] right now? I've been heartened, actually, by the extent to which it's broken through [3:24] in a time where the attention economy is so kind of schizophrenic and shallow. This is a story that, [3:32] in my view, affects all of us. And when I spend a year and a half of my life, and my co-author Andrew [3:38] Morant's also spent that time of his really trying to do something forensic and meticulous, [3:44] it's always because I feel like there are bigger structural issues that affect people, you know, [3:50] beyond the individual at the heart of the story, beyond the company at the heart of the story. [3:53] Sam Altman, against the backdrop of Silicon Valley hype culture, right, and startups that balloon to [4:02] massive valuations based on promises that may or may not come to pass in the future, and an increasing [4:08] embrace of a founder culture that thinks of as a future, not a bug, telling different groups different [4:16] conflicting things. Even against that backdrop, Sam Altman is an extraordinary case where everyone in [4:24] Silicon Valley who expects those things can't stop talking about this question of his trustworthiness [4:32] and his honesty. And, you know, we knew already that he had been fired over some version of allegations of [4:40] dishonesty or serial alleged lying. But extraordinarily, despite the fact that there's been wonderful [4:48] reporting, you know, Keech Hagee has done great work on this, Karen Howe has done great work on this, [4:54] there really wasn't definitive understanding of the actual alleged proof points and the reasons why those [5:01] have stayed out of the public eye. Point number one is, I feel heartened by the fact that some of those [5:07] gaps in our public knowledge, and even in the knowledge of Silicon Valley insiders, have now been [5:13] filled a little bit more. Some of the reasons that they were gaps have been filled a little bit more. [5:19] You know, we report on cases where people inside this company really felt like things were covered up [5:25] or deliberately not documented. One of the new things in this story is that a pivotal law firm [5:29] investigation by Wilmer Hale, you know, which is obviously a fancy, credible, big law firm that did [5:35] investigations of Enron and WorldCom, which, by the way, were all voluminous, like hundreds of pages [5:41] published. They did this investigation that was demanded by board members that had fired Altman [5:46] as a condition of their departure when he got rid of them and he came back. And extraordinarily, [5:52] in the eyes of many legal experts I spoke to, and shockingly, in the eyes of many people in this [5:56] company, they kept it out of writing. All that ever emerged from that was an 800 word press release from [6:03] OpenAI that described what happened as a breakdown in trust. And we, you know, confirm that this was [6:11] kept to oral briefings. There's cases we talk about where, like, for instance, a board member seemingly [6:19] wants to vote against the conversion from OpenAI's original nonprofit form into a for-profit entity, [6:26] and it's recorded as an abstention. And there's like a lawyer in the meeting saying, [6:31] well, that could trigger too much scrutiny, and it gets, the person wants to vote against, [6:37] and it gets recorded as an abstention to all appearances. You know, there's factual dispute, [6:42] OpenAI claims otherwise, as you might imagine. But these are all cases, essentially, where you have [6:47] a company that, by their own account, holds our future in their hands, right? The safety stakes are [6:54] so acute, they have not gone away. This is the reason this company was founded as a nonprofit focused on [6:59] safety. And where things were being obscured in a way that, like, credible people around this [7:06] found less than professional. And you couple that with a backdrop where there's so little political [7:12] appetite for meaningful regulation. And I think it's a very combustible situation. The point for me [7:20] is not just that Sam Altman, you know, deserves these questions so acutely. It's that any of these [7:27] guys in this field, and many of the key figures exhibit, like, if not this particular idiosyncratic [7:35] alleged lying all the time trait, certainly like some degree of a race to the bottom mentality, [7:39] right, where the people who were safetyists have watered down those commitments, and everyone is in a [7:44] race posture. I think the point as we look at, like, even recent leaks out of Anthropic is, [7:51] there's a person who poses the question of who should have their finger on the button in this [7:54] piece. The answer is, like, if we don't have meaningful oversight, I think we got to be asking [7:59] serious questions and trying to surface as much information as we can about all of these guys. [8:04] So I've been heartened by what feels like a meaningful conversation about that, or the beginnings of [8:08] one. The reason I asked it that way is, you worked on this for a year and a half, [8:13] you talked to, I believe, 100 people with your co-author, Andrew. That's a long time for a story [8:17] to cook. And I think about the last year and a half in AI in particular, and boy, have the attitudes [8:24] and values of all these characters shifted very quickly. Maybe none more so than Sam Altman, who [8:32] started off as the default winner because they had released ChatGPT and everyone thought that would [8:35] just take over for Google. And then Google responded, which seemed to surprise them that Google would try to [8:42] protect its business, maybe one of the best businesses in tech history, if not business history. [8:47] Anthropic decided that it would focus on the enterprise. It seems to be taking a commanding [8:52] lead there because the enterprise users of AI are so high. And OpenAI's product, they're now refocusing [8:59] away from we're going to take on Google to Codex, and they're going to take on the enterprise. And I just [9:04] can't quite tell, over the course of reporting, over the last year and a half, did it feel like the [9:09] characters you were talking to changed? Their attitudes and their values, did those change? [9:15] Yes. I think, first of all, that the critique that is explored in this piece, [9:21] coming from many people inside these companies at this point, that this is an industry that, [9:27] despite the existential stakes, is descending into something of a race to the bottom on safety, [9:34] and where speed is trumping everything else, that concern has grown more acute. [9:37] And, like, I think those concerns have been more validated as the past year and a half [9:43] has transpired. Simultaneously, attitudes about Sam Altman specifically have changed. [9:50] You know, when we started talking to sources for this, people really, really were leery of being [9:59] quoted about this, going on the record about this. And then by the end of the reporting, you know, [10:03] you have a body of reporting where people are talking about this very openly and explicitly, [10:07] and you have, like, you know, board members saying, like, he's a pathological liar, he's a sociopath, [10:13] um, a range of perspectives from, uh, this is dangerous, given the safety stakes that we need, [10:20] leaders of this tech that have elevated integrity, all the way up to, like, forget the safety stakes. [10:25] This is behavior that is untenable for any executive of any major company, that it just creates too much [10:31] dysfunction. So the conversation has become much more explicit, um, in a way that feels maybe belated, [10:39] but is, uh, heartening in one sense. And Sam Altman, to his credit, the piece is very fair and even [10:46] generous, I would say, to Sam. You know, this is not the kind of piece where there was a lot of gotcha [10:50] stuff. This is like, I spent many, many hours on the phone with him as we were finishing this up and [10:56] really heard him out. And as you can imagine in a piece like this, not everything makes it in. And [11:02] some of those cases in this one were because, like, I was listening sincerely. And if Sam was actually [11:08] making an argument that I felt carried water, that something, even if it was true, could be [11:12] sensationalist, um, you know, I really erred on the side of keeping this, like, forensic and measured. [11:20] I think that is being received rightly. And I just hope this factual record now that's [11:26] accumulated over this period of time can trigger a more bracing conversation about the need for [11:31] oversight. That's actually my next question. I think you talked to Sam a dozen times over [11:35] the course of reporting the story. Again, that's a lot of, a lot of conversations over a long period [11:39] of time. Do you think Sam changed over the course of the reporting over the past year and a half? [11:44] Yeah, I think one of the most interesting subplots in this is that Sam Altman is also [11:51] talking about this trait more explicitly than he has in the past. Um, the posture of [11:57] Sam in this piece is not like there's nothing there. You know, this is not true. I don't know [12:01] what you're talking about. The posture he has is, you know, he says that this is attributable to [12:08] a people pleasing tendency and a kind of conflict diversion. Um, he's acknowledging that it caused [12:14] problems for him, particularly earlier in his career. He is saying, well, I've kind of, I am moving [12:22] past that or have to some extent moved past that. I think what's really interesting to me is the [12:27] contingent of people we talked to who were not just sort of safety advocates, um, not just the underlying [12:33] technical researchers who very often tend to have these acute safety concerns, but like pragmatic [12:39] big time investors, um, who are backers of Sam's who, in some cases, look at this question and talk [12:46] about even having played a key role in him coming back after his firing. Um, and now say on this [12:54] question of like, has he reformed to what extent is that change meaningful? Uh, well, we gave him the [13:01] benefit of the doubt at the time. And I'm thinking of, you know, one prominent investor in particular [13:06] who said, but since then, like, it seems clear he wasn't taken out behind the woodshed was the phrase [13:12] that this one used, um, to the extent that was necessary. And as a result, it seems like this is [13:18] now like a stable trait. Like we're seeing this in an ongoing way. Um, and you can look at some of [13:24] open AI's biggest business relationships and the way they kind of carry the weight of that mistrust, [13:31] um, in, in an ongoing way, like Microsoft, uh, you talk to executives over there, there's really acute [13:39] and like recently catalyzed concerns. Um, there's this instance where in the same day, open AI is [13:47] reaffirming their exclusivity with Microsoft with respect to underlying stateless AI models. [13:54] And then announcing a new deal with Amazon that's to do with selling enterprise solutions, [13:59] uh, for building AI agents that are stateful, meaning they have memory. And you talk to Microsoft [14:07] people and they're like, that's not possible to do without interacting with the underlying stuff that [14:14] we have an exclusivity deal on. So that's just like one of many small examples where [14:19] this trait has tendrils into ongoing business activity, um, all the time and is a subject of [14:25] active concern, you know, within open AI board, within open AI executive suite, um, and in the [14:31] wider tech community. You keep saying that trait, there's a line in the story that to me feels like [14:37] the thesis of the story. Uh, and it's a description of the trait you're describing. Uh, it's that Sam Altman [14:42] is unconstrained by the truth and that he has two traits that are almost never seen in the same person. [14:47] The first is a strong desire to please people to be liked in any given interaction. And the second [14:52] is an almost sociopathic lack of concern for the consequences that may come from deceiving someone. [14:58] I have to tell you, I read that sentence 500 times and I tried to imagine always saying what people [15:05] wanted to be liked and then not being upset when they felt lied to. And I couldn't, I could not [15:12] make like my emotional state understand how those things can exist in the same person. [15:17] How, as you've talked to Sam a lot, you've talked to people that have experienced these traits. [15:22] How does he do it? [15:23] Yeah. You know, it's interesting on a human level because I do approach bodies of reporting [15:29] like this with a real focus on humanizing whoever's at the heart of it and like seeking deep [15:35] understanding, right. And empathy. When I kind of tried to approach this from a more human standpoint [15:41] and say, Hey, like this would be devastating for me if so many people that I've worked with said, [15:48] I'm a pathological liar. Um, how do you carry that weight? Like, how do you do talk about that in [15:55] therapy? What is the story you tell yourself about that? You know, I got some sort of, in my view, [16:01] maybe like West coast platitudes about like, yeah, I like breath work. Um, but not a lot of the kind [16:09] of bracing sense of deep self confrontation that I think a lot of us would probably have if we were, [16:16] if we were seeing this kind of feedback about our behavior and our treatment of people. [16:21] And I think that that actually goes to the broader answer to the question too. Um, Sam asserts basically [16:27] that this trade has caused problems, but also that it's part of what's empowered him to, um, [16:33] accelerate open AI's growth so much that, you know, he is able to, um, unite and please essentially [16:41] different groups of people. Um, he's constantly convincing all of these conflicting constituencies [16:47] that what they care about is what he cares about. And that can be a really useful skill for a founder. [16:53] Um, you know, I've talked to investors who then say, well, maybe it's a less useful skill for [16:57] actually running a company because it's so, so much discord, but on the Sam personal side, [17:03] um, you know, I, I think the thing that I pick up on when I try to connect on a human level on this, [17:10] the apparent lack of like deeper confrontation and reflection and like, and self accountability [17:17] also informs that whether you want to call it a superpower or a liability for a company preparing [17:22] for an IPO. He is someone who, in the words of one former board member, there's this, um, uh, [17:29] former board member named Sue Yoon, who's on the record in the piece saying that to the point of [17:33] fecklessness is the phrase she uses. Um, he really believes the shifting reality of his sales pitches, [17:41] or is able to convince himself of them. Or at least if he doesn't believe them, it is able to, [17:48] uh, you know, bluster through them without like meaningful self doubt. I think the thing that [17:55] you're talking about where you or I might, as we're saying the thing and realizing that it conflicts [18:00] with the other assurance we've made, kind of have a moment of freezing up, um, or checking ourselves. [18:08] I think that that doesn't happen with him. Yeah. And, you know, there's a wider Silicon Valley [18:14] hype culture and like founder culture that, uh, kind of embraces that. [18:20] Yeah. It's funny. The verge is built on what amounts to a product reviews program. [18:25] Like it's the heart of what we do here is we, I hold a trillion dollars of Apple R and D once a year [18:30] and say, this phone is a seven and it, it sort of legitimizes all of our reporting and our opinions [18:35] elsewhere. Right. We, we have an evaluative function and we spend so much time just looking [18:40] at the AI products and saying, do they work? And that feels missing from a lot of the conversation [18:46] about AI as it is today. There's endless conversation about what it might be able to do, [18:50] how dangerous it might be. And then you drill down and you say, does it actually do the thing it's [18:54] supposed to do today? And in some cases, the answer is yes, but in many, many cases, [18:58] the answer is no. And that feels like it connects to the hype culture you're describing and also to the [19:04] sense that, well, if you say it's going to do something and it doesn't, and someone feels bad, [19:08] that's fine. Cause we're onto the next thing. Like that's in the past. And in AI in particular, [19:15] Sam is so good at making the grand promises, right? Just this week, I think the same day [19:20] as your story published, open AI released a policy document that said, we have to rethink the social [19:25] contract and have AI efficiency stipends from the government. And this is a grand promise about how [19:32] some technology might shape the future of the world and how we live. And all of that relies on the [19:38] technology working in exactly the way that maybe it's promised to work or it should work. [19:42] Did you ever find Sam doubting AI turning into AGI or super intelligence or getting to the finish line? [19:51] Because that's the thing that I wonder about the most. Do, is there any reflection about [19:55] whether this core technology can do all of the things that they say it can do? [20:00] It's exactly the right set of questions. There are credible technologists that we spoke to in [20:06] this body of reporting. And obviously Sam Altman is not one, right? He's a business person who say [20:13] the way that Sam talks about the timeline for this tech is just way off. You know, there's blog posts [20:20] going back a few years where Sam is saying, we've already reached the event horizon. AGI is like basically [20:25] here. Um, super intelligence is around the corner. We're going to be on other planets. [20:30] Uh, we're going to be curing all forms of cancer. Like truly I'm not, uh, you know, embellishing. [20:37] The cancer one is actually interesting that Sam is hyping up the person who [20:40] theoretically cured their dog's cancer with chat GPT. And that simply did not happen. [20:46] They, they talked to chat GPT and that helped them guide some researchers that actually did the work. [20:51] But the one-to-one this tool cured this dog is not actually the story. [20:57] I'm glad you raised that because I want to go on to this bigger point about, you know, [21:01] when is the, both the potential and the risk of the technology really going to vest? Um, [21:06] but it's worth mentioning these like little asides constantly that happen from Sam Altman, [21:12] where he seems to embody this trait all over again. I mean, to use the example of the Wilmer Hale report, [21:18] um, where we had this information that it had been kept out of writing and wanted to know, [21:26] you know, was the brief, the oral brief along the way given to anyone other than the, the two board [21:32] members Sam helped install to oversee it. And he said like, yeah, yeah, no, I believe it was given to [21:38] everyone who joined the board after. And that is, we have, you know, a person with direct knowledge [21:45] of that saying that is simply a lie. Um, and like, that really does appear to be the case, [21:53] uh, that that is untrue, you know, and if we want to be generous and perhaps he was misinformed. [21:58] Um, so there's a lot of these casual assurances. And I, I use that example in part because [22:04] that's a great example of, uh, dissembling, let's call it, that can have real consequences legally. [22:13] You know, I don't need to tell you like under Delaware corporate law, if this company IPOs, [22:19] shareholders could under section 220, like complain about this and demand underlying [22:24] documentation. There's already board members saying like, well, wait a minute, that briefing [22:29] should have happened. So these things that seem to jump out of his mouth all the time, [22:33] they can have like real market moving effects, real effects for this company and, and bringing it back [22:38] to the kind of utopian hype language that's resurfaced, I think not coincidentally on the day [22:45] this piece came out, um, also effects for all of us, um, because the dangers are so acute, you know, [22:54] with respect to the way it's being deployed in weaponry, with respect to the way it's being used [22:58] to identify, uh, chemical warfare agents, um, the disinformation potential, you know, uh, [23:05] because of the way in which the utopian hype, um, does seem to be prompting a lot of credible [23:11] economists to say this has all the signs of a bubble. Even Sam Altman has said, you know, [23:17] someone's going to lose a lot of money here. That could really like crater a lot of American [23:22] and global economic growth if there's like a true puncturing of a bubble involving all of these [23:27] companies doing deals with each other, going all in on AI while borrowing so heavily. [23:32] So what Sam Altman says matters. And I think the preponderance of people around him, you know, [23:39] you mentioned, we talked to more than a hundred. It was actually well over a hundred. We had a [23:42] conversation at the finish line where it's like, would it be too petty to say it's like this much [23:46] higher number. And we were like, yeah, let's downplay. Um, we'll play it cool. But it was, it was so, [23:50] so many people and such a significant majority of them saying this is a concern. And I think that's [23:57] all why let me ask you about that, that number. And as you mentioned, people got more and more [24:01] open with the concerns as time went on, it feels like the pressure around the bubble, the race to [24:08] win, to pay off all this investment, to emerge as the winner to IPO. That has changed a lot of [24:15] attitudes. It certainly created more pressure on Sam and open AI. We published a story this week, [24:18] just about the vibes of opening. Your story is part of it, but massive staffing changes in the executive [24:23] ranks at open AI. People are coming and going. The researchers are all headed away, largely to [24:27] anthropic, which I think is really interesting. You can just see this company is feeling the pressure [24:32] and it's, it is responding to that pressure in some way. But then I think back to Sam getting fired [24:38] and very memorable. This is just memorable for me. It's memorable for no one else. But I took a [24:43] source call at the Bronx zoo at 7 PM on a Friday. And it was someone saying, they're going to try to [24:48] get Sam back. And then we spent the weekend chasing that story down. And I was just like, I'm at the [24:52] zoo. Like, what do you want me to do here? And the answer was stay on the phone. Well, my daughter [24:56] was like, get off the phone. And like, that's what I did. It was ride or die to get Sam back. [25:00] That company was like, no, we're not letting the board fire Sam Allman. The investors, [25:05] they're in quoted in your piece. We went to war, I think is the thrive capital position [25:09] to get Sam back. Microsoft went to war to get Sam back. It's later. And now everyone's like, we're [25:16] very, we're going to IPO. We're going to, we got to the finish line. We got our guy back and he's going [25:19] to get us to the finish line. We're concerned. He's a liar. Why was it war to get him back then? [25:24] Because it doesn't seem like anything has actually changed, right? You talk about the, [25:28] the memos that Ilya Sutsukovar and Dario Amede kept while they were contemporaries of Sam Altman. [25:34] Ilya's number one concern was Sam is a liar. None of that has changed. So why was it war to bring him [25:39] back then? And now that we're at the finish line, it, it seems like all the concerns are out in the open. [25:44] Well, first of all, sorry to your daughter and my partner and all the other people around [25:49] journalists. It was quite a weekend for everyone. [25:51] Um, yeah, no, it does take over one's life. Uh, and this story definitely has mine, uh, over the [25:58] last period of time. It actually relates to this theme of, of journalism and access to information. [26:05] I think, um, you know, the, the investors that went to war for Sam and all played roles in making [26:13] sure he came back and the board that had been specifically designed to protect a nonprofit's [26:20] mission to put safety over growth and to fire an executive. They couldn't be trusted with that. [26:28] Them going away that, that was all because yes, the market incentives were there, right? You know, [26:34] Sam was able to convince people, well, the company is just going to fall apart. Um, but the reason he [26:38] had support was lack of information. Um, those investors in many cases now say, you know, I look [26:49] back and, and, uh, I, I think I should have had more concerns if I had known fully what the claims [26:55] were and what the concerns were. Not all of them. Opinions vary. And we quote a range of opinions. [27:00] Um, but there are significant ones who were acting on very partial info. [27:07] The board that fired Sam was in the words of one person who used to be on the board, you know, [27:14] very JV. Um, and they fumbled the ball hard and, you know, we document the underlying, uh, complaints [27:24] and people can decide for themselves whether it accumulates into the kind of urgent concern they [27:28] felt it was. But, uh, that argument and that information was not being presented. They received what [27:37] some of them now acknowledge as bad legal advice to describe it. You'll remember the quote, probably [27:44] a lot of your listeners and viewers will remember the quote, you know, a lack of candor was what it [27:49] was reduced to. And then they like, essentially wouldn't take calls. So you would not take calls. [27:55] I'm sure you tried. I, everyone I know tried and it was like, you, you, and we, it, it got to the [28:00] point where, you know, as a journalist, you're not supposed to give your sources advice. But I, I was like, [28:05] you know, you, you, it, this will go away if you don't start explaining yourself. [28:09] And that's what happened. And, and so you had, you know, forget journalists like Satya Nadella [28:15] saying like, what the hell happened? I can't get anyone to explain to me. And that's the company's [28:20] major financial backer. Um, and then you have like Satya calling Reid Hoffman and Reid calling [28:27] around and saying, I don't know what the fuck happened. Um, and they're like, understandably in [28:32] that void of information, looking for, you know, the, the traditional non AI indicators that would [28:38] justify such an urgent, sudden firing, like, okay, it was, was it sex crimes? Was it embezzlement? [28:44] And the entire subtle, but I think meaningful argument that this tech is different and that [28:50] this kind of a steady accumulation of smaller betrayals actually could have meaningful stakes, [28:58] both for this business and maybe for the world, that was really largely lost. And so, you know, [29:05] capitalist incentives won out, but also the people who made it went out, were not always operating [29:13] with complete information. I want to just ask about the, the, what everyone thought it was [29:17] aspect for one moment. Cause I certainly saw the news and I said, oh, something bad must have happened. [29:21] You've done a lot of Me Too reporting, famously, you broke the Harvey Weinstein story. Uh, you spent a lot [29:26] of time reporting on these claims that I think you decided were ultimately unfounded that, uh, Altman [29:33] had sexually assaulted minors or hired sex workers, or even murdered an opening a whistleblower. Did you, [29:39] I mean, you are the person who can report this stuff the most rigorously. Did you, did you decide that [29:44] came to nothing? Well, look, I'm not in the business of saying something has come to nothing. What I can say [29:51] is I spent months looking at these claims and did not find corroboration for them. And it was striking to me [30:00] that, you know, these guys, these companies who have so much power over our futures truly are spending a [30:09] disproportionate amount of their time and resources in a childish mud fight. Um, you know, it's one executive [30:16] describes it as Shakespearean. It's like the amount of, you know, private investigator money, the [30:22] opposition dossiers being compiled, uh, it's relentless. And the unfortunate thing is that [30:28] the kind of salacious stuff, which gets parroted by Sam's competitors as just assumed fact, right? [30:37] There's this allegation that he, you know, pursues underage boys and you at many cocktail parties in [30:44] Silicon Valley, you hear this. And like on the conference circuit, I've heard it repeated by like [30:50] credible, prominent executives. Like everybody knows this is a fact. You know, I talk about where this [30:55] comes from, right? The various vectors by which it's transmitted, Elon Musk, uh, and his associates [31:01] seemingly pushing like really hardcore dossiers, um, that kind of amount to nothing. They're vaporous [31:07] when you actually start to look at the underlying claims. The sad thing is that it really obscures [31:14] the more evidence-based critiques here that I think really deserve urgent oversight [31:20] and consideration. The other theme that really comes through in the story is [31:24] almost a sense of fear that Sam has so many friends, he's invested in so many companies [31:30] from his previous role as CEO of Y Combinator, just to his personal investing, someone which is in direct [31:34] conflict with his role as CEO of OpenAI, that there's silence around him. There's one line that's [31:40] really struck me. You describe Ilya's discoverer's memos and they're just out in Silicon Valley and [31:44] everyone calls them the Ilya memos, but there's even silence around that, right? They're passed around [31:48] but they're not discussed. Where do you think that comes from? Is it fear? Is it a desire to get angel [31:54] investment? Where does that come from? I think it's a lot of cowardice, I'll be honest. You know, having [31:59] reported on national security stories where the sources are, you know, whistleblowers who stand to lose [32:04] everything and like face prosecution and they still do the right thing and talk about things to create [32:12] accountability. I've worked on, you know, the sex crimes related stories that you mentioned where [32:19] sources are deeply traumatized and fear like a very personal kind of retribution. [32:26] In many cases around this beat, you're dealing with people with their own profile and power, [32:32] right? You know, they're like either famous people themselves or they're surrounded by famous people. [32:38] Um, they have robust business lives. Um, and in my view, it is actually like very low exposure for [32:47] them to talk about this stuff. And thankfully like the needle is moving as we talked about earlier and [32:51] people are now talking more. But for such a long time, people really just shut up about it because I [32:58] think the Silicon Valley culture is just so kind of ruthlessly self-interested and ruthlessly business [33:06] and growth oriented. So, you know, I think this afflicts even like some of the people who were [33:12] involved in firing Sam, where you saw in the days after, yes, one factor that led to him coming back and [33:20] the firing of old board members was that he rallied investors who were confused to his cause. [33:28] But another is that so many other people around it who had the concerns and voiced them urgently [33:35] just folded like napkins and changed their tune the moment they saw the wind was blowing the other way [33:41] and they wanted in on the profit train. It's pretty dark, honestly, from my standpoint as a reporter. [33:47] Some of those people are Mira Murati, who for, I believe, 20 minutes was the new CEO of OpenAI. [33:54] She was then replaced. It was a very complicated sort of dynamic and obviously Sam came back. [33:59] The other person is Ilya Suitskever, who was one of the votes to remove Sam. And then he changed his [34:04] mind or at least said he changed his mind and then he left to start his own company. Do you know what [34:07] made him change his mind? Was it just money? Well, to be clear, I'm not singling those two out. [34:11] There's also, you know, there's other board members who were involved in the firing who also [34:14] fell very silent after. I think it's like a wider collective problem. These are, in some cases, [34:24] people who had the moral fiber to sound alarms and take radical action. And that is to be commended. [34:30] And that's how you assure accountability. And that could have helped a lot of people who are [34:36] affected by this technology. It could have helped an industry to remain more safety focused, [34:40] meaningfully. But, you know, dealing with whistleblowers a lot and people who try to [34:46] prompt that accountability a lot, you see that it also, it takes the fiber of sticking it out [34:52] and standing by your convictions. And this industry is truly full of people who just do not stand by [34:58] their convictions. Even though they think they're building digital God that will somehow either [35:03] eliminate all labor or create more labor or something will happen. Well, that's the thing. [35:08] So it's the culture of not standing by your convictions and all ethical concerns falling [35:13] by the wayside the moment there's any heat or anything that could threaten your own standing [35:16] in the business, um, is, you know, maybe all well and good to some extent for business as usual [35:22] companies that are making whatever kind of widget. But these are also the same people who are saying [35:27] this could literally kill us all. And, you know, again, you don't have to go to the Terminator [35:32] Skynet extreme. Like that is a set of risks that are already materializing. It is real. They are [35:38] right to warn about that. Um, but you know, you'd have to have someone else armchair psychologize how [35:46] those two things can live in the same people where they're sounding the urgent warnings. [35:50] Uh, there may be like putting a toe in and trying to do something and then they're just folding and [35:55] falling silent. And, and that is precisely why you can have these kinds of instances of things [36:03] being kept out of writing and things being swept under the rug and no one talking about it this [36:08] openly for years after the fact. The natural responsible party here would not be the CEOs of [36:14] these companies. It would be governments. In the United States, maybe it's state governments, [36:17] it's federal government. Certainly these companies all want to be global. There's lots of global [36:21] implications here. I watched open AI and Google and Anthropic all sort of goad the Biden administration [36:28] into releasing an AI executive order. It was pretty toothless in the end. It just said they had to [36:35] talk about what their models are capable of and release some safety testing. And then they all kind [36:39] of backed Trump and Trump came in and wiped all that out and said, we have to be competitive. It's a [36:43] free for all go for it at the same time that they're all trying to raise money from Middle Eastern [36:50] countries that have lots of oil monies that want to change their economies. Those are politicians. [36:55] I feel like politicians should definitely understand someone is talking out of both [36:59] sides of their mouth and they're not going to be too upset if someone's disappointed in the end. [37:04] But the politicians are getting taken for a ride too. Why do you think that is? [37:07] This is really, I think why the piece matters in my view and why it was worth spending all this time [37:13] and detail on. We are in an environment where the systems that, as you say, should be providing [37:20] oversight are just hollowed out. And that's a post-Citizens United America where the flow of money [37:30] is so unfettered. And it's a particular concentration of that problem around AI, right? Where there's these [37:39] PACs, um, that are like proliferating and, and flooding money into quashing meaningful regulation [37:46] at both a state and a federal level. You have Greg Brockman, um, you know, Sam's second in command [37:53] directly contributing in a major way, uh, to a couple of those. And it leads to a situation where [37:59] there just really is capture of legislators and potential regulators. Uh, and that is a hard spiral to get [38:08] out of the sad thing is I think that there are simple policy moves, some of which are being trialed [38:16] elsewhere in the world that would help with some of these accountability problems. You know, you could [38:22] have more mandatory pre-deployment safety testing, which is something that is already happening in [38:29] Europe. Um, you know, for frontier models, you could have more stringent written public record [38:34] requirements for the kinds of internal investigations, um, you know, where we saw things being [38:39] kept out of writing. In this case, you could have a more robust set of national security review [38:44] mechanisms for the kinds of like middle Eastern infrastructure ambitions that Sam Altman was [38:50] pushing. Um, and as you say, where he was kind of doing this bait and switch of with the Biden [38:56] administration saying, regulate us, regulate us. Um, and like helping them craft an executive order. [39:02] And then the moment Trump gets in, like truly in the very first day is just going, no holds barred, [39:08] let's accelerate and let's build a massive, you know, uh, data center campus in Abu Dhabi. [39:13] You could have, this is a really simple one, like whistleblower protections. There, there is no federal [39:20] statute protecting AI company employees who disclose these kinds of safety concerns that are being aired in [39:26] this piece. You know, we have cases where like Jan Laika, who's was a senior safety guy at the time [39:32] leading super alignment at the company writes to the board, essentially whistleblower material saying [39:37] the company is going off the rails on its safety mission. Um, like those are the kinds of people [39:44] who should actually have an oversight body they can go to, and they should have explicit statutory [39:51] protections of the kinds we see in other sectors, right? Like this is simple to replicate a [39:56] kind of a Sarbanes-Oxley style, uh, regime. I think that despite how, uh, acute the problem is [40:05] of Silicon Valley, assuming control of all of the levers of power, um, and despite how hollowed out [40:12] some of these institutions that might provide oversight and guardrails are, I still do believe [40:19] in the basic math of democracy and of self-interested politicians. And there is more and more polling [40:26] data emerging that a majority of Americans think that the concerns or questions or risks of AI currently [40:33] outweigh the benefits. And so I think the flood of money into AI, it's within all of our, I'm sorry, [40:42] into politics from AI. It's within all of our power to make that a source of a question mark [40:50] with respect to politicians. You know, when Americans go to vote, they should be scrutinizing [40:57] whether the people they vote for, uh, especially if they are, you know, uncritical and anti-regulation, [41:05] given all these concerns, um, you know, are bankrolled by big tech special interests. [41:11] So I think like if people can read pieces like this and listen to podcasts like this and care enough [41:17] to think critically about their decisions as voters, uh, there is a real opportunity [41:24] to generate a constituency in Washington of representatives who do keep an eye and do force [41:31] oversight. That might be one of the most optimistic things I've ever heard anyone say about the current [41:35] AI industry. And I appreciate it. I might, I'm obsessed with the polling that you're talking about. [41:40] There's a lot of it now. It's all pretty consistent. Uh, and it kind of looks like the more young [41:45] people in particular are exposed to AI, the more distrustful and angry they are about it. That's, [41:51] that's kind of the valence of all the polling. And I look at that and I think, well, yeah, [41:54] smart politicians would just run against that. They would just say, we're going to hold big tech [41:57] accountable. And then I think about the past 20 years of politicians saying they're going to hold [42:02] big tech accountable. And I'm struggling to find even one moment of big tech holding, [42:06] being held accountable. And the only thing that makes me think this might be different [42:10] is, well, you actually have to build the data centers and you can vote against that and you can [42:16] petition against that and you can protest against that. You know, I think there's a politician who [42:20] just had their house shot at, cause they voted for a data center. The tension is reaching, I would call [42:25] it a fever pitch. You've described the insularity of Silicon Valley, right? This is a closed ecosystem. [42:31] It feels like they think they can run the world, right? They're, they're putting a ton of money into [42:35] politics and they are running up against the reality of people don't love the products, [42:40] which doesn't give them a lot of cover, right? The more they use the products, the more upset they [42:45] are. And the politicians are beginning to see there are real consequences to supporting the tech [42:50] industry over the people they represent. You talk to so many people, do you think it is possible for [42:55] the tech industry to learn the lesson that is right in front of them? [42:58] You know, you say it feels like they think they can run the world without accountability. I don't [43:04] even think that needs the feels like qualifier. I mean, you look at like the language Peter Thiel [43:09] is using, it's explicit, right? And of course that's an extreme example. And, uh, you know, [43:16] Sam Altman, though he is like close with and informed by Thiel's ideology to some extent, [43:22] uh, is a very different kind of person who might sound, you know, different and more measured [43:26] up to a point. But I do think like the wider ideology that you get from Thiel, which is [43:32] basically like, we're done with democracy. We don't need it anymore. We have so much, uh, that we [43:37] kind of just want to like build our own little bunkers. Uh, we're not dealing with the Carnegie's [43:42] anymore or the Rockefellers anymore where they're bad guys, but they're, you know, they feel they [43:47] need to participate in a social contract and build things for people. There's a real nihilism [43:52] that set in. And I do think it's just been like a mutually reinforcing spiral in recent American [43:59] history of, uh, moguls and private companies acquiring super governmental power, uh, while, [44:08] uh, democratic institutions that might hold them accountable are hollowed out. [44:12] And I do not feel optimistic about the idea that those guys might just wake up one day and think like, [44:19] huh, actually maybe we do need to participate in society and help build things for people. [44:25] I mean, you look at like the little microcosmic example of the, the giving pledge where, you know, [44:30] there was a moment where it was seemly to be charitable. And that moment is now like passed [44:37] and even kind of ridiculed. That is a problem. The broader problem of lack of accountability, [44:43] um, that I think can only be solved extrinsically. That has to be voters mobilizing, um, and like [44:55] resurrecting the power of government, uh, oversight. Um, and you're exactly right to say that the main, [45:04] uh, vector through which people could maybe achieve that is like, it's local. It's to do with where [45:10] infrastructure is being built, you know, and you mentioned some of the like white hot tension [45:14] around this that's leading to violence and threats. And obviously like nobody should be [45:17] violent or threatening, but I, and I'm also not here to make specific, um, policy recommendations [45:24] other than to just present, like, these are some of the policy steps that seem basic and are working [45:28] elsewhere in the world. Right. Or that have worked in other sectors. Um, I'm not here to say which of [45:33] those should be executed and how I do think something needs to happen and it needs to be external, [45:39] not just trusting these companies. Cause right now we have a situation where the companies that are [45:45] developing the tech and are equipped best to understand the risks and in fact are the ones [45:51] warning us of the risks are also the ones with nothing but incentive to go fast and ignore those [45:59] risks. And you just don't have anything to counterbalance that. So whatever form reforms might [46:05] take in terms of specifics, something has to run up against that. And I, and I do still return to that [46:13] optimism that the people still matter. Generally by argument, let me just make the one tiny counter [46:20] argument that I think I can articulate. The other thing that could happen outside of the ballot box [46:26] is that the bubble pops, right? That not all these companies get to the finish line, that there isn't [46:32] product market fit for consumer AI applications. And again, I don't, I don't quite see it yet, [46:37] but I'm a consumer tech reviewer and maybe I just have higher standards than everybody else. [46:40] There is product market fit in the business world, right? Having a bunch of AI agents write a bunch [46:46] of software seems to be a real market for these tools. You can read the arguments from these companies [46:51] saying we've solved coding and that means we can solve anything. If we can make software, we can solve [46:55] any problems. I think there are real limits to the things software can do there. That's great in the [47:01] business world. Software can't solve every problem in reality, but they got to get there. They got to [47:05] finish the job and maybe not everybody makes it to the finish line. And there is a crash and this [47:09] bubble pops and maybe open AI Aranthropic or XAR, one of these companies does like fails and all this [47:16] investment goes away. Open AI is right on the cusp of an IPO. There's a lot of doubts about Sam as a [47:20] leader. Do you think they're going to make it to the finish line? I'm not going to prognosticate, [47:25] but I think you raise an important point, which is market incentives do matter internally to Silicon [47:33] Valley and the precarity of the current maybe potentially allegedly bubble dynamics do stand to [47:44] interrupt the, you know, again, potentially, according to critics, race to the bottom on safety. I would also [47:51] add to that if you look at historical precedents where there's a similarly seemingly impenetrable [47:56] set of market incentives, um, and potentially deleterious effects for the public, there's impact [48:04] litigation. And you see that as an area of concern lately. Um, like Sam Altman is out there this week, [48:11] uh, endorsing legislation that would shield AI companies from some of the types of liability that [48:19] open AI has been exposed to, right? And wrongful death suits, for instance. Um, of course, there's [48:24] a desire to have that shield from liability. I think that the courts can still be a meaningful mechanism. [48:32] Um, and it'll be really interesting to see how these suits shape up. Um, you know, you already saw, [48:39] for instance, the class action suit actually of which I and many, many other authors I know are members [48:46] against anthropic, um, for their use of, of books, um, that were under copyright. If there are, you know, [48:54] smart legal minds and plaintiffs who care, we just have seen historically in cases from big tobacco to [49:02] big energy, um, that you can also get some guardrails and some incentives to slow down or be careful or [49:11] protect people that way. It does feel like the entire cost structure of the industry hangs on [49:19] a very, very charitable interpretation of fair use. Doesn't come up enough, right? The cost [49:25] structure of these companies could, could spiral out of control if they have to pay you and everyone [49:29] else whose work they've taken, but that it's inconvenient to think about. So we, we just don't [49:35] think about it. Right next to that is all these products are now running at a loss. Like currently today, [49:39] they're all running at a loss. They're burning more money than they can make. At some point, [49:43] they have to flip the switch. Sam is a businessman, right? As you've mentioned several times, he's not [49:47] a technologist, he's a business person. Do you think he's ready to flip the switch and say, [49:50] we're going to make a dollar? Cause that, when I ask, do you think OpenAI is going to make it? It's, [49:54] they got to make a dollar. And so far, Sam has made all of his dollars by asking other people for [49:59] their money instead of having his companies make money. Well, that's a big lingering question, [50:04] you know, for Silicon Valley, for investors, for the public. Uh, you see some statements and moves out of [50:11] open AI that seem to evince a, uh, evince a kind of panic about that. Um, you know, shutting down [50:17] Sora, shutting down some ancillary projects, trying to zero in on the core product. Um, but then on the [50:24] other hand, you still see at the same time, tons of mission creep. Um, right. You know, even like the, [50:30] as a small example, it's obviously not core to their business, but like the TBPN acquisition, [50:35] by the way, right. As we were reaching the finish line and fact checking, um, the, the company facing [50:41] this kind of journalistic scrutiny acquires a platform where they can, you know, have more [50:46] direct control over the conversation. Um, I, I think that there's a lot of investors that are [50:53] concerned based on the conversations I've had that this problem of promising all things to all people [50:59] also extends to this lack of focus in the core business model. Um, and I mean, you're closer to [51:09] the kind of prognosticating and watching the market than I am probably, uh, I'll leave you and I'll [51:14] leave the listeners to be the judge of whether they think open AI can flip the switch. Well, I asked [51:20] the question, cause you've got a quote in the piece from a senior Microsoft executive. And it is that Sam's [51:25] legacy might end up more similar to Bernie Madoff or Sam Bankman freed than Steve jobs. That is quite [51:31] a comparison. What'd you make of that comparison? I think that's a paraphrase. The Steve jobs thing [51:35] isn't part of that quote, but yes, there is this extraordinary comparison to, I think it's actually, [51:40] there's an interesting sort of sobriety to it. Cause it's phrased as like, I think there's a small, [51:44] but real chance that he winds up being a, uh, you know, an SBF or a Madoff level level scammer, [51:51] meaning to my mind, not that Sam is being accused of those specific types of fraud or crimes, [52:00] but that the degree of dissembling and deception from Sam may have a chance of ultimately being [52:09] remembered, uh, at that scale. Um, yeah, I think what's most striking about that quote, honestly, [52:16] is that, you know, you call around at Microsoft and you don't get a, like, that's crazy. We've [52:22] never heard that you get a lot of like, yep. A lot of people here think that, which is remarkable. [52:27] And, and I think it does go to these nuts and bolts business questions that there are investors [52:34] who say like one told me, for instance, look, in light of the way in which this trade has persisted [52:41] in the years after the firing. Um, this was also like, I thought an interesting sober thought, [52:46] uh, that it's not necessarily that Sam should be at the absolute bottom of the list should be like [52:53] the lowest of the low in terms of the people that absolutely must not build this technology. [52:58] Um, for what it's worth, there's several people who say Elon Musk is that person. [53:01] Yeah. Um, but that this trait puts him maybe at the bottom of the list of people that should build [53:09] AGI, um, you know, and beneath several other leading figures, um, in this field. So I thought [53:15] that was an interesting appraisal, you know, and, and that's the kind of thinking I think that you get [53:19] from the, like the real pragmatists who maybe aren't buying into the safety concerns as much. They're [53:24] just growth oriented and they think that open AI now has a problem with Sam Altman. [53:29] The, uh, the Microsoft piece of it is really interesting. That company thought they were on [53:34] top of the world that they had made this investment and they were going to leapfrog everyone, especially [53:38] and most importantly, Google back into consumer good graces and the level to which they feel [53:44] burned by this adventure. This is a very soberly run company. Uh, I don't think can be overstated. [53:50] You mentioned the characters and the personality traits. I want to end here with a question from our [53:54] listeners. I said on the, on our other show, the verge cast that I was going to be talking to you. [53:58] And I said, if you have questions for Ronan about this story, let me know. So we have one here that [54:01] I think ties in neatly with what you're describing. I'm just going to read it to you. [54:04] How do the justifications for bad behavior, cutthroat actions of Altman and other AI leaders [54:10] differ from the justifications Ronan has heard from other high profile leaders in politics and media? [54:15] Don't they all justify their actions by saying, this is how the world gets changed. [54:19] If I don't do this, someone else will. [54:20] Yeah, there's a lot of that going around. I would say what is distinctive to AI is that the [54:28] existential stakes being so uniquely high means both the statements of risk are extreme, right? [54:37] You have Sam Altman saying this could be lights out for all of us. And also the kind of, you know, [54:43] critics might say mania that the questioner is referring to is extreme. The thing that, um, [54:51] Sam accused Elon of on the record, you know, that, that, uh, maybe he wants to save humanity, [54:56] but only if it's him, the kind of ego component of wanting to win, which is a framing Sam uses [55:03] all the time, um, that this is one for the history books. This could change everything. [55:07] And therefore even above and beyond the, you've got to break a few eggs mindset of most Silicon [55:14] Valley enterprises, there is in the minds of some figures leading AI, I think a complete [55:20] rationalization for any and all fallout. Um, and you know, forget breaking eggs. I, I think a lot [55:27] of the underlying safety researchers would say like potentially risking breaking the country, [55:33] breaking the world, breaking, you know, millions of people whose jobs and safety hang in the balance. [55:41] That's, what's unique about it. And that's where, you know, I, I close reflecting on this body of [55:47] reporting, really believing this is about more than Sam Altman. This is about an industry that is [55:54] unconstrained and a spiraling problem of America being unable to constrain it. [56:00] Well, we, we had some optimism in there, but I think that's a good place to leave it. [56:04] There's a lot coming up. And on a downbeat. [56:05] Of course. Uh, that's every great story, really. The Musk Altman trial is upcoming. [56:11] I think we're going to learn a lot more here. I suspect I will want to talk to you again. Ronan [56:15] Farrow, thank you so much for being on Decoder. Thank you. [56:17] I'd like to thank Ronan Farrow for taking the time to join Decoder and thank you for listening. I hope [56:24] you enjoyed it. If you'd like to let us know what you thought about this episode or really anything [56:26] else at all, drop us a line. You can email us at decoderattheverge.com. We really do read all the emails. [56:31] Or you can hit me up directly on threads and Blue Sky. If you'd like Decoder, please share it with your friends and subscribe [56:35] wherever you get your podcasts. Decoder is a production of the Verge and part of the Vox Community Podcast Network. [56:39] We'll see you next time.