Sam Altman: Can't Quit Manual Email, Despite AI Tools

Sam Altman, head of OpenAI, admits he still manually scrolls through his emails. This is despite building AI tools, like Codex, that could automate much of this work. He described this habit as psychologically inconsistent with his own technology. Altman believes he should hand more routine tasks to Codex, including moving information between apps and managing his to-do list. Yet, he feels something in his mind links this manual work to being productive. What's interesting is Altman also acknowledged that the AI industry, including OpenAI, may have overestimated how quickly the technology would reshape the economy. He thought there would be more disruption after GPT-4, but found the economy adapts more slowly. This suggests that even with powerful AI, human habits and economic inertia play a significant role in how quickly new technologies are adopted.