Sam Altman
Sam Altman
Samuel H. "Sam" Altmanis an American entrepreneur, programmer, venture capitalist and blogger. He is the president of Y Combinator and co-chairman of OpenAI...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBusinessman
CountryUnited States of America
billion build companies dollar love people shortcut
The way to build billion dollar companies is to first build something people love. There isn't really a shortcut there.
authority companies founders great history returning
There is a long history of founders returning to companies and doing great things. Founders are able to set the vision for their companies with an authority no one else can.
ambitious time work
Very ambitious startups often take a long time to work - or sometimes they take a very long time to look ambitious.
determination intelligence
Intelligence is usually easy to tell in a 10-minute conversation. Determination is harder.
buy manage unheard
If you wanted to build an Internet startup in 2005, you had to buy your own servers and hire someone to manage it. Now, that's unheard of.
capital easy either figure good money needs offering raise
Generally, you want to raise capital either when you have to or when it's really easy. If the company desperately needs money, and they can't figure out any other way, then they need to raise money. Or if someone's offering you easy money on good terms, you should take it because you can use it for good things.
lose model money plenty
I have plenty of investments that I wish I'd never made. But the model is to lose money on a lot of investments and then make 1,000X or 10,000X on an investment.
early love maybe outcome runway stage
I love working with really early stage startups where the outcome is still in doubt. Maybe they'll go on to greatness, or maybe they'll never get off the runway at all.
people profile sell stuff
The nice thing about Reddit is, we don't have to sell your data or build a profile of you or do stuff that makes people feel uncomfortable.
biggest experience
The biggest part of Loopt is about discovering the world around you, never replacing a social experience - only adding to it.
bad compete diagram famous good great ideas lie people secretly thus totally until
There's this famous observation that I totally believe: Great startup ideas are the ones that lie in the intersection of the Venn diagram of 'is a good idea' and 'looks like a bad idea.' So you want most people to think it's a bad idea and thus not compete with you until you get giant. But for it to secretly be good.
clearly describe
It's easy to say, 'I'm going to build something that already exists,' but it's difficult to clearly and succinctly describe something new.
family handful hundred low prefer priority
Never put your family, friends, or significant other low on your priority list. Prefer a handful of truly close friends to a hundred acquaintances.
feature
Asking what I'd do without Loopt is almost like asking what I would do if I didn't have a smartphone because the feature set has become the norm for me.