Sam Altman says he worries AI could be controlled by a few companies or people

ChainCatcher reported, citing Business Insider, that OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on the David Senra podcast that he worries AI could one day be controlled by a small number of companies, models, or individuals, leaving most consumers without a voice in how the technology shapes the world. Altman said the right approach is for people to remain firmly in control of the future, with society and models evolving together. He also said he worries about AI getting out of human control. At the same time, Altman said excessive fear of that second risk could make the first one real, as some people may push for giving up large amounts of freedom in exchange for safety. The article said he may have been referring to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who has repeatedly warned about AI risks and called for stronger government regulation. Anthropic is the only major AI company that did not sign a public letter supporting open-weight models. OpenAI has not open-sourced its frontier models, but last year it released two open-weight models, gpt-oss-120b and gpt-oss-20b. Altman also said U.S. AI leaders have not done enough to show the public how the technology can increase personal autonomy. He said he expects the biggest startup boom yet, adding that AI is enabling more people to start small businesses.