Politics

AI Billionaire Sam Altman Bows to Trump With Very Weird Praise

ALTMAN RIGHT

The OpenAI CEO said he had been stuck in a “npc trap,” invoking a slang term that originates from video games.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, accompanied by U.S. President Donald Trump, Oracle CTO Larry Ellison, and SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, speaks during a news conference in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on January 21, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Sam Altman, the CEO of ChatGPT maker OpenAI, said he has “changed his perspective” on President Donald Trump and thinks he will be “incredible for the country in many ways.” The Silicon Valley billionaire related, in a tweet, that he previously fell into a “npc trap” regarding Trump—invoking a slang term, which stands for “non-playable character” and refers to programmed background characters in video games. It is used to malign someone who does not think for themselves. There might be a simpler explanation for Altman’s come-to-Donald moment: Trump invited Altman, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, and Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son to the White House earlier this week and staged a presser where he flattered a joint venture among the tech-focused firms that will invest up to $500 billion in artificial intelligence infrastructure. Trump even claimed the partnership as a victory for himself, calling it a “resounding declaration of confidence in America’s potential under a new president.” Altman, meanwhile, has been embroiled in an online spat this week with MAGA billionaire Elon Musk, once his pal and now Trump’s. “They don’t actually have the money,” Musk tweeted, accusing Altman and his partners of lacking the $100 billion in initial funds to get their initiative, dubbed Stargate, off the ground. Altman called the allegation “wrong.”

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