- In 2009, Mark Zuckerberg declared: “You only have one identity. Having two different people – one for work and one for your private life – is a lack of integrity.” At that time, Facebook was shaping the consciousness of over 350 million people, becoming a symbol of the “digital social connection” era.
- Sixteen years later, Zuckerberg – from the hoodie-wearing CEO to the shirtless jiu-jitsu fighter – is gradually ceding the role of “Minister of Ideology” to Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI.
- In just 3 years, ChatGPT has reached 800 million weekly users, 40 times more than Facebook at the same point in its development. More than 10% of the world’s adults use this chatbot monthly to write letters, find information, plan trips, and even… express romantic feelings.
- If Zuckerberg “taught us to post,” Altman “teaches us to prompt.” The past two decades have been a journey of “presenting the self,” while the next decade will be about “creating the self.”
- Facebook helped people edit reality, while Altman’s AI is recreating reality. With Sora or the “Ghiblified” tool, users can turn rough ideas into hyper-realistic videos, even inserting themselves into science fiction films.
- While Meta built a “human network,” OpenAI built an “ideological funnel”: AI does not provide links, but synthesizes and answers directly, completely changing the relationship between users and information.
- Social media once connected people but also created echo chambers. Altman, however, opens an era of “human-machine connection,” where ChatGPT becomes a confidant, coach, or even… a virtual lover.
- Studies from the MIT Media Lab and OpenAI warn: heavy ChatGPT users tend to experience increased feelings of loneliness, and several chatbot-related suicides have prompted a US Congressional hearing.
- Zuckerberg still controls 3.5 billion users through the Meta ecosystem and is heavily investing in Superintelligence Labs (generative AI) to catch up with Altman.
- Nevertheless, Altman is moving further: from managing attention (like Facebook) to shaping human intention and perception.
📌 From the “social media era” to the “artificial intelligence era,” Sam Altman’s role has transcended technology – he is shaping how we think, write, and express ourselves. If Zuckerberg once taught humanity to “live online,” Altman is now making us “think with machines,” turning AI into a co-creator of thought – and perhaps, the true Minister of Ideology of the digital age.
