Read this: Inside the mind of the tech bro

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We're going to get inside the heads of the Tech Bros yes, they are almost all men and gauge that you thought and implement Walter isaacson is here the format CNC oh is Elon musk's authorised biography and also wrote the definitive book on Steve Jobs and much more also in the studio head and Lewis staff writer at the Atlantic and Shona Ghosh deputy exam Business Insider UK welcome to you all.

Thank you for coming on the media show before we get into some bigger questions.

I just want to talk about those dramatic development at open AI the company behind because on Friday TVs active sammelman one of the brightest stars of the booming AI industry was unceremoniously dumped by the board of a company he co-founded now 5 days late.

Yes back Shauna explain what has happened.

I mean I don't you covered it well and you know anytime in the next 30 seconds or 30 minutes the story could change again, but as you say I say I one of the the most exciting companies in artificial intelligence right now did else that see you and co-founder some almond it then cycle through to other CEO before returning to Sam out them.

They have been rumbling by 5 days and no one actually knows why any of this happens at has been speculation, but you know the board the company have not precisely confirm.

This is taking place so we don't even know why so we don't have a sense of why the originally did that is this speculation around insuring you know humanity has protected from the places a I might be headed and outsmarting us all the people on one side or the other of that debate there a competing narratives, so the board itself said something very interesting at the time and it's now changed the board was made up of

I think it was for people on the board who initiated the elves sing out man and in a statement the board said that Sam and had not been consistently candid in his communicate with them which is a kind way of saying you know he lied about something or misrepresented the truth, but then no one went into specifics and that bit of the stories of died and then became outside of further conversations of was it tensions about opening hours corporate structure.

It's a little unusual for a private company.

It's actually run by a non-profit Aspect motivations may be quite different from the prophet on the produce chat GPT so there was a tension between actually this non-profit on that might be prioritising AI safety you know not taking all of his job vs.

Making as much money from charity as possible.

So there are a number of completing the artist not clear which one is correct again Helen I couldn't help but notice that there's a photo doing the rounds at the moment.

Keyboard in it, but there's no women on it.

I wonder whether that's a surprise to you.

It's one of those was a woman.

She is probably the technical officer but I think you often says I'm in this case the code to the founder.

You know what happened that border century was people said I don't want to work at open AI if it doesn't have someone in charge anymore 500 700 employees the same going with him and said that's very symptomatic of the fact that a lot of these enormous companies.

You know giant companies are kind of seen through the prism of them being 1 charismatic person at the head of them who sings come to the company and then it is true of some on Monday as it is Elon Musk Twitter / X or Mark Zuckerberg meta.

You know they are the person is the company they are the brand are the Promise they are the Vision the people want to work for ok? We might come back over there later if you got time and white or matters, but I want to bring in other Isaacs in his book it on musk is nearly 700 pages long and take.

From musk's childhood and the regular beating the and George from school bullies in South Africa all the way through to last April when is Starship rocket exploded after takeoff the biography is full of conversations with the had asked the richest man in the world in case you've forgotten and insights into what drives him to behave the way he does and water I said at the start we wanted to get inside the heads of the 10th.

Do you feel that you did that with mask? I think I know much better than I know myself, but he was strikingly transparent almost as if it was a radical decision to see how transparent you can be not only every medians in business conspiracy meetings bad is different girlfriends and women and I put nothing off limits one of the interesting things are tired back.

Play the opening to the very end of the book.

You'll see I get I have just finished reporting any county vs.

One more time you going to come back and he's actually vans Oasis who is the mother of couple of his children but also the head of neural implants chips and the Brain to connect two computers and he said I'm really worried about AI because we do associated with open AI he wasn't really the only founder mask and many others found it and mask had insisted it be cold open aib open source in a beer non-profit and so at the end of my book is having this big falling out with Sam Altman and saying I've got to start my own money because I am helping his bed clothes instead of open and made a for-profit and nonprofit and tell me what might be surprised to hear that for sure.

It's not exactly how you expect necessary.

Must have to be around for 2 years and I was 1.1 when he describes himself as obsessive-compulsive and someone who has to win is that what did you find about him? No one of the things since very early childhood when he had no friends at all.

He's on the item spectrum.

Very lonely beaten up as you said quite a bit he sits in the corner of the bookstore there and put any weed sci-fi in the comic book the X-Men Comics and develops a sense of himself as Captain Underpants jokes about how the superheroes in the Comics are all trying to save the world but the one on depends on the outside, so they look ridiculous and any letters.

It's a bloody are trying to save the world and he almost wants to pursue that and so I think that he had this has the sense of himself as almost the comic character but with these very strong missions.

But if he doesn't appear to value nice when he is scathing for example of the Twitter cry later fired because the CEO and his you can't be nice dance behaving properly operating with not matter to him much your Helena's riding but there's two which is the temporal mentality of not particularly having a pee and we can go back to probably everybody you're dealing with which is built in the early days of Microsoft and Jeff bezos with Amazon and certainly Larry and Sergey and definitely Steve Jobs and Steve Jobs and Elon Musk told that empathy can be a drawback from operating within the rules there, isn't it? Oh yeah, I thought you said been nice here whether they think it's ok to eat if you're nice.

Didn't you operate within the rules UK problem? You're nice to people will part of being nice having a party which I think some especially online maths good day.

Because it was hard wiring these ideas on spectrum and the upbringing just is not wired to be have empathy his brother Campbell said I'm the one who got the empathy Jane mask would tell you is that sometimes if you have so much empathy for the people around you you gonna lose side of the mission.

You're not gonna drive hard enough and it becomes vanity.

You're almost there people like you so much that I know I think in the BBC I want to watch it and then he went to me but I cared too much they have a lie to me.

I think it was a bit of an insecurity.

I had and I was not disruptive enough now.

You're other point was not just niceness but rules and yeah, if you say the things had your guiding principles number one would be question every rule question every regulation and obviously at the moment is around the fact that he bought.

Impact on that later, but for now and you were there when he decided to buy it.

Why do you think you did 45 reasons but it was last March and April and I'm really well for me.

You just want to 33 rocket that landed up writing to be reused made a million tesla's become the richest person become the financial time person of the year and he said I made a video games.

I love playing them and whenever I middle level the game I can never be happy after moved to the next level the game and he went to say what would be the next level part of it as he felt that Twitter evolved from being Joe Biden Barack Obama support and move to watch my call the populist right step-by-step moments every few days and felt there Twitter it become to work that may be over years but he told his parents are really.

He had family issues to that made him worry about wokeness.

He also felt that it was circumscribing free speech too much that people who question whether the virus was allegedly weather in lockdown till working with being censored.

I think that was more of a justification and a deep mission, but there are many reasons to buy Twitter including the fact that he had $10 in his pocket.

He said what part of do I like the most.

What do I use the mouse and it was Twitter he sent me as well done it right.

Ok? Can we talk about more wider going to work in culture of these places inhalers.

You were mentioning not to see you must but matters Mark Zuckerberg there's also Amazon's Jeff bezos off course you know open AI Sam you talked about this of cult around these people.

What is the working culture like in these Silicon Valley are they more colds than companies.

I think yes, I think there is a mission-driven state.

Elon Musk as I want to die on Mars you know that he thinks he wants to live this very big life and take people with him on this vision when he took over what was in Twitter he said only want people are extremely hard core and you know he was strange pictures of people sleeping in the offices and he cut loads of those rolls, then you've all gone and got two can a fat and can place and only want them in the 20 days of culture and all of these places you can read about it on my sleeping on the on the factory Floor at the car factory, so there is a kind of our fetishization about being Pioneer you know which is also very American write this idea of like the Prometheus you know you're going out and doing stuff and it has to be said that for a certain country people that is really appealing.

They don't want that 925.

It's very interesting you know I will tell you more but sometimes you talk to people maybe come out of Elon Musk business.

Slightly bruised.

They nonetheless talk about him in the slightly mess and it turns out.

They were lucky to be in the room with such a

God-like figure even if it wasn't you no objective outside sound horrible to live for it to extreme sort of the cuddling culture of a nice good place with that is no coffees and yoga room and that's why Twitter was a new and they said we care about psychological safety he walks in and where is a psychological safety that enemy we change the culture and when you talk about people work for him.

There's a guy and my butt named Andy crabs and he was in charge of the Launchpad in South Texas and one day at about 14 on a Friday night Moscow there any dancing enough people working he goes ballistic and Andy crabs kinda survive the family says I'm just totally burned after leave until I explained it all thinking about 2 weeks ago.

I'm in Los Angeles doing a booked our let's see this tool the guy and he said what happened.

He said well.

I left SpaceX because mask was driving me crazy.

But now I'm going back.

I don't want to miss the message from business inside that means people have so much power if you take Elon Musk for example.

Yeah.

He has was infrastructure influence over the cars.

We drive the media.

We see the satellite network he's been reported to influence Russia's war with Ukraine is he accountable enough all these people accountable enough nope.

I don't think the regulation is it needs to be another big debates over whether regulation is the tool with which to check what I would describe as the growing lateral power of particularly the founder ceo's the American founder ceo's all of this is unique to the founders.

Who is still helping their company's you don't necessarily have to be the same kind of ego from Canada who is the chief executive of Microsoft and a long time worker but not its founder at the same for Sundar Pichai who runs Google but it's not it's founder so some of the skull thickness is

Need to the founder CEO character and particularly the American fantasy.co character and I think it's safe assets particularly of American corporate culture that founders is particularly attack which in the grand scheme of things as early in its development have been able to accrue power laterally outside of the domains and certainly outside of their areas of expertise into politics into all kinds of hours Media I'm in mosque is essentially the world's biggest Media Baron Cohen Twitter x sorry you no more powerful than I would argue owners of British newspaper, but isn't regarded in those times necessarily or regulation those time so there should have known mechanism as the other has caught up to the amount of lateral power that has been approved by these companies and I'm just a return briefly to the culture points.

I don't think it is necessary to have the consciousness that these companies.

I would I would mention Johnson one who runs and video.

Founder CEO of NVIDIA hugely successful AI check company is the company that has powered open AI to its current success, there are a few stories that I'm aware of those of his ego.

He said he sounds relatively nice doesn't work very hard and makes it seem very hard, but you don't hear the same kind of stories and he presents you know with great a new Once in interviews and say I'm us character and has achieved incredibly impressive things with incredible and similar foresight the numbers.

So it doesn't have to be this way guys.

It's in you immerse yourself in Mask if you like for 2 years.

Did you see any point that you could fall victim to the mythmaking around him.

Oh? Yeah, I mean the couple of things you worry about the other the Heisenberg Principle which is by observing a particle you going to have emotions have bad.

He has so little emotional input-output that I really never felt him pushing me much or may affect my present affecting him.

And there was things that I found so cringeworthy or a polling in I quite happily put them all in the what was the most important thing.

I think sometimes the way he treats people but I do think giving the current few weeks.

He has a conspiracy mindset that goes back to his father who was a Dr Jekyll Mr Hyde who believes Anthony fealty did I mean all these weird conspiracies and there are times when musk goes into work Grimes his girlfriend caused even mode where he just gets dark for 45 hours and embraces conspiracy theories and post them and it is an acronym for the apparent show Dimension Data power the influence of these people leave on mask over the media as we are the media show it is worth spending a bit of time looking at big text attitude to journalism.

We can it be summed up at

Suspicion know definitely I mean I think there was a phase may be in the early 2010s.

Where was pretty gushing journalism about about the new tech companies that was really exciting a new is utopian and this was what was apparently Arab Spring this is going to liberate us and be more democratic and then at some point that really curdled.

I think not entirely coincidental understand that Donald Trump came to power in America and now actually I think their fault suspicion from journalism towards the Tech companies and very much the same thing goes in the other direction and you will often see musk saying you know don't get your news from the mainstream Media get it right here.

You know everyone should come and poppy seeds directly and that's much more honest and then he would much rather do an interview with somebody like the podcast Alex Friedman who is very much in the same seen as in the texting him and he would sit down with the BBC he's happy with that kind of friends as well, put the friendly conspiracy zone.

He has got any kind of intellectual you know Millie around and believes is very specific set of things and he's comfortable with in that.

They aren't just suspicious of the media new tech business is fundamentally undermine the ways traditional Media for example access is audiences and revenue know the there isn't destruction going on.

Yes, I think all publishers internet publishers.

Would tell you that you know Facebook and you know I think pretty much at the director of Mark Zuckerberg its.co and found Facebook to Finchley switched off the pipe which means that at one point Facebook was re-prioritise and having news in your feed Sophie opened the outfield.

See a lot of content from the BBC business.

You know new Statesman the Atlantic etc and now that has gone away publishers.

No longer prioritised in the feed and that has hearts you know revenue both directly and indirectly and that is a decision B ack company and has directly impacted publishers, so I think where there was a bit of a loving perhaps 5 years ago are on both sides.

There is definitely Great Escape

And will be until going forward and was right.

It's about 20 hours you no mask as I said bought last year.

How do you assess the impact? He has had on.

What is we should say now called XZ he put his thumb on the scale very much to open it to more conservative and particularly popular stride which it been pushed off and that's fine.

I guess but what is a problematic is they get a fight some of them is specially ones that may be involved in HP2 whatever he said so many times when taking over Twitter I believe in freedom of speech but not freedom of reach by watching men.

They won't can a fire the people who said really bad.

Thanks, and he is not fulfil that promise the white house recently can Dandy dormice endorsement want it called a hideous anti-semitic conspiracy theory on the platform last week must describe Media stories came.

He's anti-semitic is bogus.

Cabin in the platform he said it's going to be said it your book.

I think it's going to take 5 years to turn x around at this rate.

Will it still be here in 5 years I mean but I think about continue to the right there question maybe it's going to be propped up by some hardcore bluetec subscribers.

He will you know hand over the the 999 a month or whatever it is quite pricey subs.

It's hard to see it remaining a viable business of course.

It's not private so we can't tell but it's done.

It doesn't feel like it's driving musk said he's using data from EX2 trainasone artificial intelligence business and we talked earlier about what's happened open AI one of his rivals but Helen Lewis it's room at the board and open AI split over concerns about the ethics of developing is technology concerns.

You might be moving too fast how why did you get those concerns of shared across big tech? They are they are sure but there is also an assumption that you can do things that are at least.

It's not really than grey area.

Ireland from Malta bugaboo Steve Jobs in Heathrow restarting phone freaking essentially piggybacking on other people's phone like this was an illegal thing to do but he got away with it and went on to develop skills that made him a billionaire for a counterpoint someone like Sam bankman-fried of the crypt exchange ftx was doing the kind of things that people said for this looks a bit suspicious, but it was only when the House of Cards that they didn't have the money to pay back deposit is that he would know he's to protect your throat and convicted open AI has been training its large language models on this huge corpus of stuff written by other people in the permission stated that I would say at the best extremely unclear but this is the kind of silicon the attitude, which is you do it first and you ask permission later or you wait for the regulators to catch up later and she was saying earlier about how Elon Musk in a is courses around AI is worried about being a protecting humanity against robots.

He says I just wondered whether you think that's right.

You have an ulterior motive.

I mean we're on the common timeline and tax so who knows up must hear that he has been consistent in his concerns about AI but also he has a K&N products of thought so someone in his interest to continue stirring up trouble with open a irons.

You know he weighed in will also saying I don't know anything about opening a throughout the weekend knowing full well his comments would be on Excel by the media.

So you know as ever with you on my Sky think it's right to question his Motives I want to finish by thinking about this stuff really a real-world consequences of big text interventions and Walter isaacson you in charge of CNN when 9/11 happened more than 20-years ago most people don't have the internet.

They still got their news from the likes of CNN play the Horrors of what's happening in Israel and Gaza and the mainstream media On The Gatekeepers of information as they once were is that Elon Musk fault in a sentence as the Gatekeeper to the algorithm? Will I think it's

What you want mask when people like myself time and sianna, I know you would the BBC god listen to mediated and sadly we were no longer The Gatekeepers they were citizen journalism disintermediated wonderful thing even though it hurt me which was democratising and not having Gatekeepers and elites like myself, so I'd be able to tell you here is today.

I have now of course come around a little bit and think that the flow of disinformation of lies and of the fact that people can weaponize something that we we are in this world now it common source of reliable information.

Moderators on community notes and away is quite a utopian model it's the one that powers Wikipedia sounding that lots of people care enough about the subject, but it does also mean that you know most people who are there came to be one of the strategies behind them and one of the things that I consistently found that people have said is that they just feel that their feed on ex is just full of very random people pictures of gore that you probably got before lots of very upsetting pictures from Israel and Gaza and also just you can't tell her anyone is anymore one of his big Innovations was he didn't even be able to send you hate the idea of elites being charged so that goes with a blue ticks on and that was that told you that the person you were reading was really had Louis of it might be and that's all never been swept away so I thinking that says he has really rolled back the truth and I think I've got the potential to do that far more in the media.

If you look at the number of deepfakes which are already emerging you know there is going to be at just a blizzard of information coming at is that sounds very convincing that looks very.

And who are we going to trust to tell if it's real or not if we don't trust the mainstream Media anymore.

We trust some guy with a blue tick on Twitter that is not a great the world.

I want to live in Shell garage.

Yeah, I think information literacy which was already a critical skill and not everyone is equipped with information that receive in 2023 will become even more critical and harder to obtain so thinking for the deepfakes points.

I think there are negative consequences potentially for elections in 2024 small British Americans call the loving lab who you know quite small really and the relatively small amount of funding New York mayor Eric Adams has ordered the voice cloning startup using a New York mayor Eric Adams is already use that to translate his voice you know translate his own political messaging and two I think Mandarin among other languages that he definitely doesn't speak that's quite a positive use of AI but you can also see how that might be.

President Biden his is used as example to say he's a little worried.

So you know I think it could be used positively but also going to need to learn to tell the difference between what's real.

What's fake very quickly and Shona mention the elections in the UK and the US and other parts of the world how worried should we be worried about how it should be we be by the combination of unfettered social media is combustible because you can target and you can micro aggressive ratio Mrs information to various people that will be very effective.

I do think Helens right that we love those wonderful days when Helen and myself were anointed blue check people cos we were part of the elite add the girls days are over but as with any disruption you go through a period where the happy to chat between those of us who were known to blue checks and the massive disruption is can.

And briefly Helen just as we come to the end all the Tech Bros any different from the industrial estatte the past well.

They're just as rich.

I mean if you look at the kind of comparative.

You know they are there.

They are the kind of railway the late nineteenth century and they are aspiring to do a simile and ambitious things in a we live in the world that they've made we live in the information environment that they have shaped so we should be having these conversations and they're all well.

They're not all you know the email.

Yeah, we need the name Jack the women more and I'm sure I know you will do that.

So thank you very much.

I pray we are getting to the end of the media show really talked about this for much longer and we will continue to but thank you so much to Walter isaacson his biography titled Elon Musk is out now had a luas from the Atlantic who has a bit coming out at some genius.

I will look forward to that Shauna goes from Business Insider UK thank you all for coming on the programs.

Thank you to everybody for listening to the media show you can catch up on BBC sounds.

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