After Being Called Out by The New Yorker, Paul Graham Responds: Sam Was Not Pushed Out of YC

According to 1M AI News's monitoring, following his direct mention in a New Yorker investigative piece, Paul Graham posted twice in response to the Sam Altman-related controversies. He first refuted the article's narrative about Sam's departure from Y Combinator. The New Yorker claimed that Graham privately acknowledged that Sam's exit from YC back then was due to a lack of trust from partners; Graham stated otherwise, emphasizing that Sam was not "fired/removed" from YC at that time, but was asked to choose between YC and OpenAI.

Graham also individually addressed the resurrected famous old remark mentioned in the article — "Drop Sam on a cannibal island, and he'd be king in five years." The New Yorker placed this statement within the context of a larger discussion on Sam's willpower, power style, and credibility controversy; Graham, however, described that the statement was originally intended to highlight Sam's "resilience, adaptability, and decisiveness," without any "dark" connotations.