# AI backlash calls for more everyday value from the technology

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/ai-backlash-calls-for-more-everyday-value-from-the/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

- Speaker: [Sam Altman](https://realalpha.app/builders/sam-altman/) · Sam Altman is CEO of OpenAI.
- Host: [Alex Heath](https://realalpha.app/people/alex-heath/) · Founder & host, Sources · Left The Verge to start Sources in 2025; it has made over $1M since, mostly from sponsors.
- Show: Sources
- Episode: [Sam Altman on Astra, AGI, and the future of OpenAI](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/), Sep 1, 2026
- Moment: 31:38 to 38:25 of the episode (7 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/ai-backlash-calls-for-more-everyday-value-from-the/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=1898

## Quote

> “i think the right way to get people to like something is to **deliver them value**”
> — [Sam Altman](https://realalpha.app/builders/sam-altman/) at [32:31](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=1951) · Sources

## Takeaways

1. People may resist AI when they see little value in it.
2. Altman disputes common claims about data-center water use.
3. He expects jobs to change, while saying the industry should deliver better work.

## About this segment

Sam Altman responds to concerns about data centers, water use, job losses and creators. He argues that useful, accessible products—and broadly shared benefits—are the best answer to public skepticism.

From “Sam Altman on Astra, AGI, and the future of OpenAI”, Sep 1, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/)

## Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

[31:43](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=1903) Yeah, I think the ability to make supply chains go faster will be very important. You're talking about giving everyone in the world AI. What do you say to the people right now who don't want more AI? They want less of it. They hate the data center in their community, whether it's yours or someone else's. You know, this is actually a thing I see a lot with like teenagers that I run into. They're like, they won't touch an AI service.

[32:02](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=1922) They like won't use ChatGPT on principle. Yeah. And there's this active like anti-AI trend. How much is it that they don't like data centers versus they don't like ChatGPT? I mean, purely anecdotal. I think it's data centers are a big problem for people. I think they see them as like, yeah, a problem. It's something they don't want. um and that ai is wasteful that it's not bringing the value that you read about the water consumption and all that which has been disproven but like you know that the value they're getting and maybe this is what we're talking about with like most people are not using agents most people but like is that the answer is like you gotta generally speaking i think the right way to get people to like something is to deliver them value yeah like the you know before chat gpt maybe people thought

[32:45](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=1965) of AI is this very abstract thing that all of a sudden people could use it and people found value. Now, I think there are a lot of people who think AI is still just JGBT and they don't know that it can do that thing with the post office and the form and the pickup for you. And probably if a lot of people use that, which they will over time, and understand that it's not actually like better Google search and that's it. You know, fusing and destroying huge amounts of water or whatever um then then there'll be more excitement but I the field is moving so fast I think it just takes a while to diffuse through society there are a lot of people using AI like this has been the fastest adopted technology ever as far as I know and there are people getting tremendous value out of it and you know I get a biased sample but I hear more from people I was able to get a cure

[33:37](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2017) this horrible disease, then, you know, I think that ChachiPT is using up all the water in the world. There is clearly that too. And the industry has got work to do in terms of how we make these products easy to use and needs to be able to get a lot of value out of. You know, I saw this thing going around about the water usage of ChachiPT. And it was like, every time you run a single ChachiPT query, it's like, you know, you run your shower for like six hours and the water never comes back and it's just it's done i don't have the exact calculation in front of me but i i think the real number is something like doing this from memory it might be wrong but it's close for every 38 000 chat to be t queries um that is the same amount of water that is used in the production of a single almond in california which is like really and this is like the full-on you

[34:28](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2068) know total true water accounting not just what's running in one data center there's a question of like where this came from because the people that are scarfing down 12 almonds at a time don't feel like they're doing something horrible from a water perspective for the most part um it is true that data centers at one point used evaporative cooling um but they have not done that in a long time like if you look at a modern very large data center it uses the like equivalent amount of water as an office building in terms of you know people like running the sinks and the toilets and whatever um so that has been a um robust meme and difficult to disprove but i don't think holds up to any scrutiny i mean and the other one is it's going to take my job it's going to replace me i think those are it's like the water it's replacing me um and it's stealing

[35:16](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2116) content and it's you know it's stealing content and not giving me the value back but not energy interestingly well energy i would put in the bucket of water just consumption um resource consumption on the jobs front i have two minds of this one i think there is going to be real jobs impact i i don't think it's going to be that there's nothing for people to do i just don't think that's how we work at all we're so wired to care about other people want to work with other people we have such a great intuition as the world evolves for what people want um i think that's a fundamentally human thing no matter how smart ai gets but it doesn't mean the jobs aren't going to transition and there will be like there is every other technology some things that are done uh better and better by technology and then people move on to hopefully better and better jobs this

[35:59](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2159) has been going for a long time i wouldn't want to take away all technology and have us all like toiling in the fields again on the other hand the job impact has been like lower than i would have expected maybe even hoped for like i think we should all want better jobs available to people and we should all want like you know human drudgery and toil to get addressed and maybe there hasn't been enough of that or as much of that as we thought there would be at this level of technology I think it's actually like a fair criticism of the AI industry.

[36:26](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2186) On the stolen content point, I actually don't hear that one as much anymore. I think it's more content creators that that's like you see that it's pretty popular on social media to see, you know. This video was made without AI or whatever. I believe very strongly that there will be new kinds of content to create new kinds of art. You know, like I remember once looking back at some of the things people said when the camera was first developed about what it was going to mean for the impact on painters.

[36:52](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2212) And at that time, I didn't think people thought of photography as a new art medium. I'm actually, I would bet pretty confidently they didn't. And I think there will be new kinds of content creation. And also, we may not care about most of it. Like, you know, our relationship with creators may be very deeply about them as people, and it doesn't matter if they use AI to make better videos or whatever.

[37:12](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2232) Do you think your foundation, which based on what I can see is maybe the best capitalized in the world, can do more here on engagement in communities on content creators in particular no just generally addressing this like very negative sentiment and saying you know we're going to show up and build libraries whatever i mean there were a lot of lessons from the industrial revolution of people who reinvested their wealth i think the most important thing we can do is to make great ai products that are useful to people make sure that power and economic power continues to be spread throughout the world that that people have access to these tools and the benefits of these tools, that we kind of advocate for what we are seeing.

[37:54](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2274) And also, secondarily to that, yes, of course, I think we should invest more in communities and I think AI is going to enable the abundance required to do that on massive scale. I really do think we are going to see transformatively powerful benefits by putting this technology in the hands of people that use it for the benefit of their own community and not us coming and telling them, what unit is a library, and what unit is a school.

[38:18](https://realalpha.app/v/VeizK1M7V7E/?t=2298) I spend a lot of time context switching between meetings,