Eric Siu breaks down Sam Altman's $7 trillion fundraising claim as a marketing tactic. Using the anchoring effect from Influence, Siu argues the huge number is designed to make smaller asks seem reasonable, like a jacket's inflated price tag making a discount feel like a steal.
Sam Altman is trying to raise $7 trillion to go on this ultimate chip mission. I don't think he's trying to raise $7 trillion. He's putting a big number out there, and I bet you he'll be happy if he gets $5 to $10 billion. What do we call that in marketing? Anchoring. Remember the book Influence? Yeah. Let's say you go buy a jacket. It's like $500 on the price tag, but then I come up to you. Hey, Neil, it's actually $100. You're like, oh, seems cheap. I got a deal. Oh, it's not $7 trillion. I only got to put $5 to $10 trillion. This is a steal. So this is the ultimate anchor from Sam.
