From an acclaimed Wall Street Journal reporter comes the first
biography of the enigmatic leader of the AI revolution, charting his
ascent within the tech world as well as his ambitions for this powerful
new technology.
On November 30, 2022, OpenAI released ChatGPT, a chatbot that
captivated the world with its uncanny ability to hold humanlike
conversations. Not even a year later, on November 17, 2023, Sam Altman,
the CEO of OpenAI, was summarily fired on a video call by the company’s
board. The firing made headlines around the globe: OpenAI is the leader
in the race to build AGI―artificial general intelligence, or AI that
can think like a human being―and Altman is the most prominent figure in
the field. Yet it was mere days before Altman was back running the
company he had co-founded, with most of the directors who voted to fire
him themselves removed from the board.
The episode was a demonstration of how quickly the industry is moving,
and of Altman’s power to bend reality to his will. In The Optimist, the
Wall Street Journal reporter Keach Hagey presents the most detailed
account yet of Altman’s rise, from his precocious childhood in St.
Louis to his first, failed startup experience; his time as legendary
entrepreneur Paul Graham’s protégé and successor as head of Y
Combinator, the start-up accelerator where Altman became the premier
power broker in Silicon Valley; the founding of OpenAI and his
recruitment of a small yet superior team; and his struggle to keep his
company at the cutting edge while fending off determined rivals,
including Elon Musk, a former friend and now Altman’s bitter opponent.
Hagey conducted more than 250 interviews, with Altman’s family,
friends, teachers, mentors, co-founders, colleagues, investors, and
portfolio companies, in addition to spending hours with Altman himself.
The person who emerges in her portrait is a brilliant dealmaker with a
love of risk, who believes in technological progress with an almost
religious conviction―yet who sometimes moves too fast for the people
around him. With both the promise and peril of AI increasing by the
day, Hagey delivers a nuanced, balanced, revelatory account of the
individual who is leading us into what he himself has called “the
intelligence age.”
Altman is a figure out of Isaac Asimov or Neal Stephenson. Or he is the
author himself: if it feels as though we have all collectively stepped
into a science fiction short story, it is Altman who is writing it.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
(4)
