Yes, Sam Altman is a known liar and cheat. With hundreds of billions of dollars on the line, the simplest answer is these are publicity stunts to grow revenue before an IPO.

I mean, really, if they were so dangerous, like "everyone" working in these companies believes, you think they would do more than amateur hour to build sandboxes?

The danger stunt is also a major distraction from talking about the real quality issues of LLMaS (LLMs as a Service). How many tokens are consumed? What quality? Was I downgraded?

By forcing the discussion about doomerism, they avoid real discussions about their service. Which is exactly what they want. You can bet when they go to "regulate" LLMs, they won't be asking the department of weights and measures to validate they are counting tokens fairly. No.

Maximum skepticism should be employed.

This is kind of like saying the warnings about cancer on cigarettes, or oil spills, are regulatory capture because the tobacco and oil companies think it makes them look cool.

They really do think AI is very dangerous and can end the world!