Ask HN: Does Sam Altman know how to code?

Related discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47711964

Does it matter?

He's the CEO. His job is to sell AI vision. I personally think AI will be the biggest consumer thing, like mobile phones.

There's a huge engineering market there for the nerds, and the output is a cool user experience.

  Altman is not a technical savant—according to many in his orbit, he lacks extensive expertise in coding or machine learning. Multiple engineers recalled him misusing or confusing basic technical terms. He built OpenAI, in large part, by harnessing other people’s money and technical talent.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/04/13/sam-altman-may...