Relentless
00:22:47 · Ty Morse, Sam Altman
[00:22:47] S0: If you had to, like, try to guess what else does Sam want to accomplish before he ranches? [00:22:54] S1: Look. AI... Superintelligence is gonna get built. Like, that... You know, not done, but, like, gonna... We are we are on the glide path. To get there is very different. Abundance and decentralization and, like, wide access to it and making sure that it ends up with, like, broadly shared prosperity, I would really like to accomplish that. So maybe that... That's the thing that I've been, like, thinking about as the next thing. Like, how does... Technologically, we're going to accomplish our mission. I think a lot of our worldview and a lot of our beliefs about safety and the impact it's going to have have also... We've gotten those things done too. But, you know, very broadly shared prosperity and a a real focus on enabling the world here. That seems very important. [00:23:39] S0: I've heard you say again and again, this idea of get on planes in marginal situations. I've done this a huge number of times. [00:23:45] S1: Does work out you? [00:23:47] S0: So far, it's working pretty well. [00:23:48] S1: Good. I think. I think it's I think it's very solid advice. [00:23:51] S0: When was the last time that you got on a plane in a marginal situation? [00:23:54] S1: Well, I can't say what for, but very recently, [00:23:56] S0: and it worked out. Congratulations. Thank you. [00:23:59] S1: And I really didn't want to. It was, like, a very inconvenient two overnights. Didn't wanna do it. New baby. Whole mess. But I did.
00:23:59 · Sam Altman, Ty Morse
[00:23:59] S1: And I really didn't want to. It was, like, a very inconvenient two overnights. Didn't wanna do it. New baby. Whole mess. But I did. [00:24:06] S0: Okay. Actually, take me into your, like, mental process for deciding to do this world tour. That is just... I mean... It... Again, it's, [00:24:15] S1: like, hard to rewind three years because now, like, it feels like AI has been here forever. But three years ago, we had just launched GPT four. The world was melting down. Everybody was freaking out. Everybody was just like, oh, man. And no one knew what to think. And I could just feel these, like, storm clouds brewing and, like, everyone was getting angry? [00:24:38] S0: Or
00:24:38 · Ty Morse, Sam Altman
[00:24:38] S0: Or [00:24:39] S1: It was like world leaders were like, do we need to, like, take control and shut things down? Like, is this thing waking up and about? It was it was a weird time. And because it had all happened so fast, people had not had time to, like, wrap their head around and go through this process, whatever. So, you know, we were, like, getting all of this escalating stuff, and all these, like, world leaders were, will you come meet us? We're, like, you know, thinking about doing this and that. And I was like, I think if I or someone from the company, but at the time, company was not very big, so I was like, probably gonna have to be me, does not go, like, show up and talk to people. I'd like a sense it's about to go very badly. And I was thinking about doing, like, a bunch of short trips, but I hate long flights. I hate jet lag. I had the whole thing. So I was like, I'm just gonna, like, get this over with in a short period of time. Brian Chesky advised me to do it. He had done something for air... Similar for Airbnb, but he had done, like, eight cities or something. [00:25:32] S0: And you're like, fuck it. We ball. Let's just do 30. [00:25:34] S1: 20... I think we did 28 countries. Thirty five days. I, like, lived on an airplane. It was a very strange [00:25:42] S0: Did you go to bed? [00:25:43] S1: I had, like, a... Yeah. Slept an airplane. Comfortable, but, yeah, I go [00:25:47] S0: I fly Coach, so it's a little bit different.
00:25:47 · Ty Morse, Sam Altman
[00:25:47] S0: I fly Coach, so it's a little bit different. [00:25:50] S1: This is better than that. Right. This is a lot better than that. But, like, you know, it's like travel still sucks. Like, you can make it as comfortable as you want, and you still, miss your own bed and your own time zone and your office and whatever. [00:25:59] S0: One thing that I've learned is no matter how many people have, like, these cures for jet lag, they're all bullshit. Like, it just sucks. Your brain doesn't like it. [00:26:08] S1: I never... And because I went to so many places, I think my biggest time zone change was four hours the whole trip. And mostly, it was like a one hour at a time hop. So I wasn't that jet lagged. I was just, like, exhausted. And it was very strange. It was kind of cool to get to see the world so quickly because you really do get a sense for cultural differences that are very subtle when you go from place to place. But by the end of it, the last few days, I started it was one of these weird, half asleep, awake kind of somewhat dreams. But I started having this vision feeling of being in my childhood bed, Interesting. Which I never had before or since. But I would sort of like vaguely wake up and I would think I was in my childhood bed in my childhood room. And I was like, Okay, this is some like deep it's time to go home thing. [00:27:04] S0: Your, like, subconscious is fighting back [00:27:05] S1: or something? Something like that.
00:27:05 · Sam Altman, Ty Morse
[00:27:05] S1: or something? Something like that. [00:27:06] S0: Interesting. When you're in zombie mode and you're kind of, like, trying to function, I think, or goblin mode, whatever you prefer, how do you change? Like, what is different about you? How do you decide to keep on going? [00:27:19] S1: I definitely got to this point near the end where I was, like, hunting down the days till I could be home. I was just like, alright. Because each day was, like, it was, like, you know, fourteen hours of, like, nonstop. And I'm, like, not an extroverted person. I You was meeting, like, hundreds of people a day in some cases. And, like, tensions lowered by the end of it, but at the beginning, like, the world was, like, very nervous. And and then, like, you know, I think once... It just, like, it did calm down. I think one thing that helped is it was clear that, like, I knew when I was going to get home and I knew I was going have to do it again for a while. I've done smaller ones since. Probably do, like, something like that once or twice a year. But I was gonna say, like, a thing I learned is that I would much rather put a bunch of international travel together in, a seven or ten day chunk than a bunch of one day trips spread out. So I always do try to do it that way now.
00:27:19 · Sam Altman, Ty Morse
[00:27:19] S1: I definitely got to this point near the end where I was, like, hunting down the days till I could be home. I was just like, alright. Because each day was, like, it was, like, you know, fourteen hours of, like, nonstop. And I'm, like, not an extroverted person. I You was meeting, like, hundreds of people a day in some cases. And, like, tensions lowered by the end of it, but at the beginning, like, the world was, like, very nervous. And and then, like, you know, I think once... It just, like, it did calm down. I think one thing that helped is it was clear that, like, I knew when I was going to get home and I knew I was going have to do it again for a while. I've done smaller ones since. Probably do, like, something like that once or twice a year. But I was gonna say, like, a thing I learned is that I would much rather put a bunch of international travel together in, a seven or ten day chunk than a bunch of one day trips spread out. So I always do try to do it that way now. [00:28:17] S0: I think a lot of people overestimate the, like, risk involved in making most actions. Like, there is a lot of risk if you're just, you know, buying a bunch of call options on Robinhood, but there's probably a lot less risk on getting on planes and stuff. What have been the best examples of times where you basically did something that seemed really risky to other people, but you knew wasn't or you believed wasn't? [00:28:42] S1: I guess the obvious example would be, like, I I was I was extremely high conviction when I buying a lot of compute.