Elon Musk avait dit un truc qui m'avait marqué sur l'allocation de ressources. En substance : passé un certain niveau de richesse, l'argent n'est plus de la consommation, c'est de l'allocation de capital.
Cette phrase change tout.
L'économie, dans le fond, c'est juste un problème d'allocation. Tu as des ressources finies et des usages infinis. Qui décide où va quoi ?
Imagine une cour de récré. 100 enfants, des paquets de cartes Pokémon distribués au hasard. Tu laisses faire. Très vite, un ordre émerge. Les bons joueurs accumulent les cartes rares, les collectionneurs trient, les négociateurs trouvent des deals. Personne n'a planifié. Et pourtant chaque carte finit dans les mains de celui qui en tire le plus de valeur. Le système maximise le bonheur total de la cour. C'est ça, la main invisible.
Maintenant fais entrer la maîtresse. Elle trouve ça injuste. Léo a 50 cartes, Tom en a 3. Elle confisque, redistribue, impose l'égalité. Trois effets immédiats. Les bons joueurs arrêtent de jouer, à quoi bon. Les mauvais n'ont plus de raison de progresser, ils auront leur part. Les échanges s'effondrent. La cour est égale, et morte. Elle a maximisé l'égalité, elle a détruit le bonheur.
Le problème de la maîtresse, c'est qu'elle ne peut pas avoir l'information que la cour avait collectivement. C'est le problème du calcul économique de Mises, formulé en 1920. L'URSS a essayé de le résoudre pendant 70 ans avec le Gosplan. Résultat : pénuries, queues, effondrement. Pas parce que les Soviétiques étaient bêtes, parce que le problème est mathématiquement insoluble en mode centralisé.
Quand Musk a 200 milliards, il ne les consomme pas, il les alloue. SpaceX, Starlink, Neuralink, xAI. Chaque dollar est un pari sur le futur. Et lui a un track record. PayPal, Tesla, SpaceX. Il a démontré qu'il sait identifier des problèmes immenses et y allouer des ressources avec un rendement spectaculaire.
L'État aussi a un track record. Hôpitaux qui s'effondrent, éducation qui décline, dette qui explose, services publics qui se dégradent malgré des budgets en hausse constante. Le marché identifie les bons allocateurs, la politique identifie les bons communicants.
Le profit n'est pas une finalité, c'est un signal. Il dit : tu as alloué des ressources rares vers un usage que les gens valorisent suffisamment pour payer. Plus le profit est gros, plus la création de valeur est grande. Quand Starlink est rentable, ça veut dire que des millions de gens dans des zones rurales ont enfin internet. Quand un ministère est en déficit, ça veut dire qu'il consomme plus qu'il ne produit. L'un crée, l'autre détruit, et on appelle ça redistribution.
Dans nos sociétés il y a deux catégories d'acteurs. Les entrepreneurs et les bureaucrates. L'entrepreneur prend un risque personnel pour identifier un problème, mobiliser des ressources, créer une solution. S'il se trompe il perd. S'il a raison, ses clients gagnent, ses employés gagnent, ses fournisseurs gagnent, l'État collecte des impôts. Il est la cellule de base du progrès humain.
Le bureaucrate ne prend aucun risque personnel. Son salaire est garanti. Au mieux il maintient une rente existante. Au pire il la détruit par excès de réglementation, mauvaise allocation forcée, incitations perverses qui découragent ceux qui produisent. Mais dans aucun cas il ne crée.
Regarde les 50 dernières années. iPhone, internet civil, SpaceX, Tesla, Google, Amazon, Stripe, mRNA, ChatGPT. Toutes des inventions privées, portées par des entrepreneurs, financées par du capital risque. Pas un seul ministère n'a inventé quoi que ce soit qui ait changé ta vie au quotidien.
La France est devenue le laboratoire mondial de la dérive bureaucratique. 57% du PIB en dépenses publiques, record absolu. Une administration tentaculaire, une fiscalité qui pénalise la création de richesse. Résultat : décrochage face aux États-Unis, à l'Allemagne, à la Suisse. Fuite des cerveaux. Désindustrialisation. Dette qui explose.
Et le pire c'est que la mauvaise allocation s'auto-renforce. Plus l'État prélève, moins les entrepreneurs créent. Moins ils créent, moins il y a de base fiscale. Plus l'État s'endette et taxe. Boucle de rétroaction négative parfaite. La maîtresse pense qu'elle aide, et chaque année la cour produit moins.
Dans nos sociétés, ce sont les entrepreneurs, toujours, qui font avancer la civilisation. Les bureaucrates au mieux maintiennent une rente, au pire la détruisent. Aucune société n'a jamais progressé en taxant ses créateurs pour subventionner ses gestionnaires.
La question n'est jamais qui a combien. C'est qui alloue le mieux la prochaine unité de ressource pour maximiser le futur de l'humanité. La réponse depuis 200 ans n'a jamais changé. Ce ne sont pas les fonctionnaires.
That’s #AIhype & overstatement of timeline & extent of industry transformation (or a misquote out of context). But… the pace of disruption is accelerating & expanding & speed & w depth even for those following tech advances and led transformations for decades are staggering
The journalist who took down Harvey Weinstein just spent 18 months investigating Sam Altman.
And what he found out is genuinely insane:
The people who built OpenAI went on record saying he can't be trusted with the future of humanity.
A Microsoft executive even compared him to Bernie Madoff.
This isn't just some hit piece.
It's 100+ interviews, secret memos, HR documents, Slack messages, and private notes that had never been seen before.
Here's everything you have to know about Ronan Farrow's investigation:
Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI's former chief scientist and CO-FOUNDER, compiled 70 pages of internal evidence against Altman. Slack messages. HR files. Behavioral analysis.
The word at the top of his list of Altman's "consistent patterns": lying.
He sent the documents as disappearing messages because he was "terrified" someone would find them. They became legendary in Silicon Valley. Insiders just call them "the Ilya Memos."
Dario Amodei, another co-founder who left to start Anthropic, kept his own private notes. One line: "The problem with OpenAI is Sam himself."
Paul Graham, the man who RECRUITED Altman to run Y Combinator, told colleagues Altman had been "lying to us all the time." Multiple YC partners had complained about Altman's behavior by 2018. He was effectively forced out in 2019 despite publicly claiming for YEARS that he left voluntarily.
Former board members described him as "unconstrained by truth."
And the investigation found that Altman reportedly lied to the board about obtaining safety approvals for some of ChatGPT's most controversial features.
That's the man running an $852 billion company with 900 million weekly users and a Pentagon contract.
But here's where this gets really crazy:
The New Yorker investigation dropped on Sunday.
SAME DAY, Altman publishes a 13 page policy paper proposing robot taxes, a public wealth fund, and a four-day workweek. The most ambitious social policy document in OpenAI's history.
Dropped within HOURS of the most damaging article ever written about him.
That's not coincidence.
Monday: Elon Musk files a court motion demanding Altman be REMOVED as CEO. He wants the for-profit conversion completely unwound.
Then Friday at 3:45 AM: a 20yo throws a Molotov cocktail at Altman's San Francisco mansion. It bounces off the house. Lights the gate on fire. An hour later, same guy shows up at OpenAI HQ threatening to burn the building down. Police arrest him on the spot.
Nobody was hurt.
But within hours, Altman posts a photo of his husband and 1yo child on his blog. Writes that he hopes the image "might dissuade the next person." Then blames the New Yorker article for making things "more dangerous" for him.
In 5 days, Altman went from the target of the most devastating investigation in tech history to the sympathetic father whose family was attacked.
Now anyone who criticizes him has to do it in the shadow of a firebombing.
The New Yorker spent 18 months building the case that Altman is dangerous. Altman turned it into the reason HE'S in danger.
And none of this changes what Farrow actually found:
- The co-founders don't trust him
- The former board doesn't trust him
- The chief scientist documented 70 pages of evidence and was too scared to send them through normal channels
- Paul Graham says he was lied to
- A Microsoft executive put him in the same sentence as Madoff
The trial starts in 16 days.
If Musk wins, the for-profit conversion gets unwound and Altman is removed.
If Altman wins, the man that every person who helped build OpenAI has publicly warned about gets permanent, unchecked control of the most powerful AI company on Earth.
Either way, one thing is now undeniable...
The people closest to Sam Altman are the ones screaming the loudest warnings.
And this week proved he knows exactly how to make sure nobody listens.
Peak manipulation.
I resigned from OpenAI. I care deeply about the Robotics team and the work we built together. This wasn’t an easy call. AI has an important role in national security. But surveillance of Americans without judicial oversight and lethal autonomy without human authorization are lines that deserved more deliberation than they got. This was about principle, not people. I have deep respect for Sam and the team, and I’m proud of what we built together.
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That’s #AIhype & overstatement of timeline & extent of industry transformation (or a misquote out of context). But… the pace of disruption is accelerating & expanding & speed & w depth even for those following tech advances and led transformations for decades are staggering
CEO of Microsoft AI Mustafa Suleyman joins FT editor Roula Khalaf to explain why most of the tasks accountants, lawyers and other professionals currently undertake will be fully automated by AI within the next 12 to 18 months https://t.co/yYKzS7NIOP
#MustWatch well put by @BenAffleck - short version #AI for smart authentic creatives who embrace it as a tool - not a threat - will see themselves become MORE important, MORE
differentiated, & become MORE creative! #EnhancedNotExctinct
As a guy who works in tech, is building with AI, and writes a weekly newsletter on the topic, I can't explain as well as Ben Affleck.
How is that possible?
@elonmusk This is THE critical issue that will define AI’s next 3-5*yrs - the “nexus” of: 1) #cleanenergy & #circular transitions; 2) the extraordinary #computing#power needed, planned & in train; 3) AI’s potential - not delusional obsession w/ #AGI - but applied safely 4 people & planet
My latest from @FIIKSA on the release of the #PriorityCompass & bridging the global optimism gap btwn North & South in areas like #AI#CleanEnergy & Investment w/ Realism but Real World Applied Technlogies 4 people & planet @DriftEnergyLtd https://t.co/pBWzTe0xrV
“In science, surprise is not the enemy—it’s the invitation.” Carl Sagan.
I would say same in biz - particularly ventures, start ups & w/ founders. See why in my board takeaways fr @DriftEnergyLtd at
@OctopusVentures this wk!😊 https://t.co/3K3BXpzOal
.@Accenture's @peterlacy shares five ways leaders can drive business value and sustainable impact while accelerating progress towards their long-term goals. #COP26#Sustainability https://t.co/4vU6IkWpKb
The transition to a #CircularEconomy could not be done without the innovations of entrepreneurs all around the world, explains @peterlacy of @accenture. Top Innovators from the @TheCirculars_22 are helping drive this change.
Find out more: https://t.co/xAlCD1HNnD
@INETeconomics Pleased to be featured by @rjocean for our new report on how scalable digital technologies can power a Digital Circular Economy to help reach a net zero future.
w/co-authors Patrick Bolton, @peterlacy, Michael Spence, @MingXuUMich
Report: https://t.co/OKh1N7LpmT
Insightful discussion yesterday with Alok Sharma hosted by @peterlacy at #HayFestival @AccentureUK “world leaders must accelerate on their commitments in the run up to Egypt where the focus will be on implementation”
Inspiring call to action from @sophiehowe Future Generations Commissioner for Wales hosted by @peterlacy at #HayFestival2022 “role of government is to make it easier for people to make the right choices”