He was CEO of Y combinator, of which this forum is sponsored and maintained by.

He’s the CEO of OpenAI, which is responsible for the most-discussed advancement in technology for the past year. So it’s not that unusual for this to be discussed on a technology-focused forum.

He’s also the centre of a massive firestorm, where extremely atypical corporate behaviour was very recently taking place. Again, highly relevant topic for a forum that deals with startups.

In short, it’s news, and specifically news of interest to people on this site. No need for cults or obsession.

I definitely get the high-level of interest and reason it's a popular topic on here. What I don't get is the intense emotional investment people have in this person. Not so much on HN but definitely elsewhere in social media.

How AI will ultimately affect humanity is uncertain, so the stewardship of an extremely influential company in that field will be of general interest.

The specific reason for the board shenanigans seems to be related to this tension on how AI will or won’t be handled by the management of the tech companies which create and manage them.

All of these feels very relevant to the general public.

a lot on HN actually, it's basically religion like it was with Steve Jobs

I think it’s his consistency; how does he garner this much respect from SV? Surely, the logic must go, he’s worthy of it.

This whole thing feels like Altman expected some back and forth here between him and the board, but in their inexperience they vastly overreacted to what was probably “standard” corporate maneuvering. He assumed there would be steady escalation, but they went right for the endgame well before passing the many opportunities for compromise that usually show up in fights between CEOs and their board.

Why do people watch pro sports? Why do we fall into the cult of the sports personality?

Why do people follow movie stars?

Because we’re human, and we gossip and obsess over high performers.

I was actually just thinking that I really miss the days when it was sports teams and athletes that people obnoxiously worshipped. Need to go back to Patriots fans being the most annoying people around.

Oh that is still happening, I promise you. Though currently the most annoying fanbase is probably the Eagles right now.

Like sports I'm here for the drama. It's a distraction to follow. If it doesn't interest you just ignore.

Someone else posted it around here - as religion recedes people need new deities. Couple that with an increase in popularity of conspiracy theories and you get altman and ai.