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Comment by shmatt | Hacker News Reader

And the funniest part is OpenAI has been refusing to hire remotely. That’s their right, but I wonder how many office days a week Sam was there with all of his other shenanigans

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman says the remote work ‘experiment’ was a mistake—and ‘it’s over’

https://fortune.com/2023/05/05/openai-ceo-sam-altman-remote-...

Tell me more, Person with 7 jobs, about how all work needs to be done from the office

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Offices are for (human) resources, where they are neatly herded and monitored and managers can look at the office every now and then and enjoy the sight of toiling crowds. It's not for the elites.

from: https://www.businesstoday.in/technology/news/story/chatgpt-m...

> He further added that OpenAI’s some of the best talents are working remotely. He said, "some of our best people are remote, and we will continue to support it always, so please don't let hating SF stop you from applying to OpenAI! I don't like the open air fentanyl markets either.”

If you're working on a ton of side hustles on company time, that might well be part of what might make you worry that your employees might do the same unless you can find ways of keeping them on a tight enough leash.

Yes, it's a double standard; but let's not pretend execs are the same as line workers with the same expectations of work environment.

I'm 100% in favor of remote work... but presumably their job postings weren't for the CEO role (or at least not then)

I've been to the OpenAI office once, and saw Sam sitting on a couch working. This is obviously just a single data point, so who knows.

Could have been on a WorldCoin zoom though

If you were the CEO of OpenAI, and you knew someday there would be a need to verify if someone is human, what would your plan be?

Not start a scammy crypto coin, that’s for sure. Stronger push of societal acceptance of public key cryptography everywhere would be a first good step.

I'm no crypto fan, but how is it scammy?

Non-humans could potentially have a public key; I'm a fan of switching to public keys in general but it doesn't solve the problem of assuring "unique humanness".

Governments do a pretty good job of verifying "unique humanness", but I suppose crypto innovation, fancy iris-scanners and a sprinkling of free-market fairy dust is what we really need in this space.

Web of trust could work fine here.

Have I met them? Check. Has someone I know and trust met them? Check. Has the government met them? Half check. Has the google met them? Quarter check.

I think the point GP is trying to make is: just because he was working out of an OpenAI office doesn’t mean he was necessarily working on OpenAI business; he could have been remotely working on some of his other ventures.

No, you're moving the goalposts here. First, it was "he doesn't go into the office", and now it's "even if he does, maybe he's not doing what he should be."

I think when people say “go into the office,” they mean the office of the company they are working for.

> "even if he does, maybe it's the wrong office."

It is sort of a nicer definition, though. The coffee shop is a workplace for the baristas, so maybe we can return to the workplace by going there instead.

These arguments are exhausting. If you are important enough affordances will be made at lots of companies.

This is such a terrible argument though. Executives in practically every industry are all over the map in their efforts and roles. They might serve on different boards or as an advisor. This is different than someone is works in a single function such as the life of a product engineer.

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