Sam Altman may be the reigning king of the AI boom, but the story that matters isn’t his rise or fall. The sector will still demand scale, speed, and the right to run roughshod over the pesky public interest, no matter who wears the industry crown.

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Last week in the New Yorker, Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz profiled OpenAI chief Sam Altman. The piece opens with the company’s chief scientist, Ilya Sutskever, doubting that Altman is the man to have his “finger on the button” of an artificial intelligence more intelligent than human beings.

What follows is the story of Altman’s fall, return, and future, including the details of the key players involved and capital at stake. The profile offers a comprehensive history of the moment, including the anxieties that attend the rise of OpenAI and what that means for us as we sort out what to do about — and with — artificial intelligence.

With AI, the stakes are high for everyone, and the story at hand is both new and familiar. As Farrow and Marantz write:

OpenAI has since become one of the most valuable companies in the world. It is reportedly preparing for an initial public offering at a potential valuation of a trillion dollars. Altman is driving the construction of a staggering amount of AI infrastructure, some of it concentrated within foreign autocracies. OpenAI is securing sweeping government contracts, setting standards for how AI is used in immigration enforcement, domestic surveillance, and autonomous weaponry in war zones.

AI: A One-Stop Shop, but for What?

Altman and others have sold AI as the solution. To what? To whatever. To everything. If you’ve got a problem, AI will solve it. Farrow and Marantz quote Altman’s own writing, offering AI as a wonder capable of “astounding triumphs” that include “fixing the climate, establishing a…