Comment by gsf_emergency_4
16 hours ago
It's in Thiel's nature to make moves counter to Altman's. Certainly, he does not share Masa's (or PG's) weakness for the genii of the day. (Secretly despises, actually?) They are kinda nontechnical in the same way (chess or SaaS are equally relevant to the future), but what Thiel has passion for are flexible moral abstractions, not politics (the whys rather than the whats of winning)
> It's in Thiel's nature to distance himself from Altman
This is way off base. Altman is basically a mentee of his, like Zuckerberg. They go way back, and they've both publicly praised each other quite recently. They're very close friends.
I've already edited to say "make moves counter to Altman's". You are right, but Thiel thinks about progress in a fundamentally different, I'd argue opposite, way from Zuck or Altman. More aligned with Elon or Karp. Or even some of the Chinese.
To be concrete, he'd never consciously engage in the kind of circular financing or rentseeking that Altman/Zuck would be open to.
(also he has enough social aptitude not to take Altman on in public.)
I don’t know, the biggest difference I see is Thiel and Elon are all about government/tax payer money (through contracts like Palantir or SpaceX, subsidies like Tesla, lobbying, influencing elections, or worst). In that way they align with China, as an autocracy directly financing their companies is their ideal business model. Altman and Zuck OTOH are more typical SV entrepreneurs.
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